Connections
by Andrea O'Down
Summary: As Donnie reflects on how he met April and how much their lives have changed since, he realizes how much they are connected. And not only that, he realizes how everything seems to be connected, friends and foes alike.
1. Connections

_This story was inspired by this cute story by a friend of mine about Donnie and April, "Walls" by Adoradork. It made me think more about Donnie's and April's connection, and it led to this. This chapter is some sort of a prologue, as Donnie thinks about his connection to April and connections in general. From then on, I intend on writing about the episodes, to go deeper into Donnie's and April's thoughts by putting some scenes out and explore them a little more. And I intend on writing some sort of missing scenes. I hope you're going to enjoy it. :)_

* * *

**Chapter 01: Connections**

_She's the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. _

With this said, their connection had been set up. From the moment on, Donatello had thought these words, they had been connected. From then on, April O'Neil had been a part of his life, and she was always going to be.

Connections are there, always, and even if they are cut, something else remains in the place, like a cut thread. The thread is still there, it just doesn't connect any longer, but it can't be erased completely. Something stays in its place, like a road that suddenly ends in a dead end. The road is still there. It always will be.

Donatello tilted his head at the thought of how April had entered his life. No, not only his life. All their lives. She was part of their family now, and they all had been going through a lot together. It looked like they were connected, in good times as in bad.

He suppressed a chuckle. Wasn't that part of the marriage vow – in good times as in bad? Had he really just thought that? But on the other hand, what other thing than a connection was marriage after all? Even if he knew it would never happen to him.

Sure, he loved April, more than anything else in the world, but marriage? That was a bit far-fetched, and a wishful dream. No, not even that. How could he dream about something that was impossible? Even if April returned his feelings – and he had no clue of that yet, just hints sometimes, and most of the times not even that –, they could never get married. So while he could dream about April and him being in love and doing all this lovey-dovey stuff these couples in movies did, he could never think of getting married. That April could return his feelings was a possibility, marriage wasn't. And his genius brain refused to waste time on things that could never happen. He had thought about it a little, but only to come the conclusion that marriage would never happen to him and his brothers. It would always be out of reach. And if they would ever experience mutual love was still written in the stars. But at least, this one was a possibility.

Donatello thought of how this one night on the surface had changed their lives forever. If he hadn't set eyes on April at that particular moment, the Kraang would have kidnapped her, and everything would be different now. From the moment he had first seen her, he had felt this connection between them, not only him and her, no, between April, his brothers, his sensei, even the Kraang and the Foot. They all were connected, some bonds stronger than others, but on the whole, it was just a map of invisible threads that bound them all together, some threads delicate like spider webs, some strong as ropes. And he hoped, no, he knew April and himself shared the latter.

As their connection to the Kraang, he had to confess, it was a difficult one. Without the Kraang, he and his brothers would still be ordinary pet turtles. They would never have mutated, they would just live their dull lives in a tank, where the most exciting thing that could happen was feeding time.

Sure, the Kraang were their enemies, and their intentions were one-hundred percent evil, but a teeny-tiny part of him was thankful to them nonetheless. Without them, he would never have turned into a mutant, he would never have been able to do all the things he loved so much like studying and inventing things, he would just be a pet turtle which's brain was run by instincts mostly.

And without them he would never have met April in the first place. Well, maybe he would have seen her, but would he ever have had the courage to talk to her? If the Kraang hadn't shown up and tried to kidnap her – and succeeded in doing so thanks to Mikey's nunchuck – he probably would just have watched her walking down the street with her father and then lost sight of her forever.

And April was connected to the Kraang, just like he was. She was important to the Kraang, she was partly Kraang herself, although they had just found out about this later. If April weren't important to these aliens, he probably would only have seen her once in his life.

But now he and April were connected by the strong rope of their friendship, and then there was this thin thread that connected them through the Kraang.

But connections weren't only a good thing. His sensei's connection with Shredder and the Foot was one of the bad kinds. But again, as deadly as their feud was, without it, Splinter or rather Hamato Yoshi would never have moved to New York, he would never have bought four baby turtles, he would never have fought the Kraang in the alley, and he would never have been mutated – and four baby turtles with him. So even bad connections could lead to something good – or not as bad. It must have been terrible for Splinter to find himself being turned into a huge rat, losing his human life too after all what he had lost already. But without it, would he still have retreated to the sewers and started a new life with his new family of four mutant turtles there? Donatello wasn't sure about that. If Splinter had stayed human, their life wouldn't have turned out like it had. Yes, maybe Splinter would still have taken care of them, no, he most certainly would have, but would their connection be as strong as it was now without the link of all of them being mutants? He wasn't so sure about that.

But he now understood what his sensei had meant when he had once told them that he had still gained something. He had lost everything, but all his loss, all these connections had led to the family they were now. And that, for once, was a good thing.

And the more he thought of it, the more Donatello realized that everything seemed to be connected with everything, there were good connections like friends, and there were bad ones like foes, there were strong ones like love and hatred, and there were weak ones like the farthest link of a reaction chain. But they all were connections.

So this was what this was all about, Donatello thought, a traffic system of well-lit freeways and cart roads, well hidden under brushes and dirt. Some people would do their best to cut connections, to hide them, to bury them as deep as they could, but they couldn't get rid of them completely. The lose end of the thread was still there, even if it didn't lead anywhere any longer. And even the smallest connection that was buried under so many more important things would never disappear. It was still there, it could still be retrieved and turned into a bigger, more powerful connection. And Donatello was sure that these connections – the denial and the enhancement of some of them – was what made them who they were. So this was what really mattered. Connections.


	2. Not Alone

_This chapter deals with "Rise of the Turtles, Part One and Two". _

* * *

**Chapter 02: Not Alone**

"Perhaps, in another year, we can try again."

Donnie looked at his sensei completely shocked, he tried to say something, to reply to that, but at first, just a few babbling syllables left his mouth before he could get a grip on himself again.

"Another year?!" he finally managed to say. "Has anybody forgotten that people have been kidnapped?! They don't have a _year_! Sensei, we have to do something _now_!"

When Splinter narrowed his eyes, it gave Donnie's heart a twinge, and for a moment, he thought he had gone too far. He had never contradicted his sensei before. But this was important! If he didn't raise his voice now, this girl and her father would be lost. They counted on them. Donnie knew it. He had seen it in the girl's eyes. She needed help, she needed him.

His brothers maybe thought more about how they had lost the fight and wanted to make up for it, or wanted to play hero – well, Leo, mostly –, but for him, this was more than that. It was about rescuing _lives_. It was about rescuing _her_.

And he knew that was what he had to make his sensei understand. Because that was what really was important.

"You weren't there, sensei," he said, trying to put all what he was feeling into his voice, his worries, the responsibility he felt, he needed to make Splinter see, "you didn't see the way that girl looked into my eyes. She was scared, and she was counting on me – _us_," he quickly corrected himself, "to save her."

Something flickered in Splinter's eyes, but Donnie couldn't quite tell what it was, and when Splinter turned around to face their family shrine, he wasn't sure what to think of it. Had he been able to make his point clear? Did Splinter understand? He wasn't sure. Should he say more? But he decided against it, he decided to give Splinter some moments to think about his words.

It didn't help with his hammering heart, though.

And then he heard it.

"Yes."

Splinter still had his back turned to them, but there was a determination in this one word, and Donnie knew Splinter had exactly gotten his point.

Splinter turned to face them again. "You _must_ save her."

Donnie's heart made a joyful jump, not because he was so happy that they would get out there and fight people again. That was rather Raph's thing. No, he was happy because he was given the chance to do something that was the most important thing for him right now. He had no idea if they would succeed, if they would really be able to save this girl and her father, but they would at least try to get them back safely. And Donnie knew he would do his best. He simply had to.

* * *

"You okay?"

The noise of the helicopter's rotors, the sound of the laser canons, her frightened outcry when she had lost her grip on the helicopter's skid, all this was still ringing in his ears. But it wasn't important any longer. He got her! She was here in his arms! He had saved her!

April – yes, she had told him her name! – was still panting for air, and he could see she was still trying to process what had just happened. But then she turned her head, looking at the helicopter that was disappearing into the night sky.

"Dad," she gasped.

It gave Donnie's heart a twinge and he followed her gaze. Now he realized that he had terribly failed. Yes, he had saved her, but he hadn't been able to save her father. And their mission had been to get them both out. They had failed.

* * *

And he couldn't get this thought out of his head, even when they were on their way out of there.

But as soon as they were safe, hiding in a dark alley, his brains kicked back in. There were other things they needed to take care of first.

He looked from one of his brothers to the other until his eyes rested on April. The girl was looking around her with haunted eyes, but when she realized that they hadn't been followed, she lowered her eyes to the ground. She looked slightly out of place with four ninja turtles around her, and somehow Donnie knew that was exactly the way she was feeling right now. She didn't know what to say or what to do. She still was scared and she was worried about her father. She had no idea what would come next.

Donnie went over to her, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. She lifted her gaze hesitantly. Maybe she wasn't even sure if she wanted to know what would come next. It would mean dealing with what has happened. Maybe she wasn't ready for that.

But although it hurt Donnie, he knew he couldn't take this into account right now. They couldn't bring her to the lair. Splinter would freak out. He had just allowed them to open one door to set at foot into this topside world. And he sure wasn't ready for letting someone into their life now. No, not now. Later, maybe, but not now.

When April was finally looking into his eyes, he felt the urge to comfort her, to tell her that everything was going to be alright, although he knew, it could turn out to be a lie. So he fought it back. Someone needed to be reasonable right now, and this someone was him.

"Is there someplace you can go?" he asked.

April flinched a bit as his words.

"My aunt's," she finally managed to say.

"Okay," Donnie said with a nod. "We'll bring you there."

* * *

And that, they had done. April could still hear Donnie's voice in her head.

_We'll stay close by._

It had replayed in her head when her aunt had opened the door to her, when she had told her that her father had been kidnapped, when her aunt had called the police, and when April had told the officers what had happened, when they and her aunt had shared disbelieving looks, when the policemen had asked if they could have a word with her aunt, and when her aunt had finally sent her into the guest room which would be her room from now on. She knew what they would talk about – that April was in shock, that her brain refused to deal with what really had happened and had set up a self-defense mechanism that made her talk about alien brains in robot bodies. With her father being a psychologist, she knew of these mechanisms, she knew what this looked like. And it was the easier explanation, the more reasonable one, no, the only _logical_ one. Well, for them, at least.

She couldn't even blame them. A few days ago, she hadn't known herself that mutants and aliens existed. And someone who hadn't seen this with his own eyes would never understand.

Suddenly, she felt the urge to talk to someone who knew what had happened. She needed someone around her who didn't think that she was in shock and making things up.

She opened the window and looked outside, scanning the rooftops if she could make these four ninja turtles out in the darkness. They had promised to stay close by after all. She did that for several moments, but she couldn't find them.

So maybe this had just been a white lie to make her feel better. Maybe they had already left her life for good to fight another dangerous mutant. She sighed again, suddenly feeling very alone, as her eyes started to prickle. These turtles were the only ones she could talk to about this, and now she felt like they had let her down. She knew that wasn't true, they weren't in her debt in any way, rather the other way round. They had saved her after all. She didn't have the right to ask, to expect something from them.

She took the old red radio from the bedside table and put it on the window bench. If she couldn't talk to anyone, maybe she could at least listen to some music, to at least do something, but then she just couldn't get herself to really turn the radio on. It felt more accurate to sit down on the window bench, to tuck up her knees, cross her arms and rest them on her knees. The prickle in her eyes grew stronger now, as she realized that she was on her own now.

And just when she felt like the first tear would escape her eyes, she heard a voice.

"April?"

She didn't even jump in surprise, because she immediately recognized it as Donatello's voice. So she only watched with big eyes as four ninja turtles appeared on the fire escape in front of her.

They were here! They really had stayed close by, and for the first time that day, she felt a little bit relieved.

* * *

_Thank you, but it's not your fight. – Yes, it is._

She could still feel the warmth of Donnie's big green hand on her own after they had taken off, still hear his unspoken words that had been hidden behind this "yes, it is", but that she had been able to hear nonetheless – that they wouldn't let her down, that she wasn't alone. And for the first time that day, she really had felt safe.

So it wasn't her fight any longer, it was theirs.

No, she wasn't alone. Not anymore, maybe she never had been. And this, despite all the terrible things that had happened, made her smile.


	3. Research

_This chapter takes place before "Turtle Temper"._

* * *

**Chapter 03: Research**

April was bent over her laptop. She nodded when she had finished reading, and marked another building on the map resting next to her laptop. Now, that made sense.

Three weeks had passed since she had been captured by some alien brains in robot bodies that called themselves the Kraang and had been saved by four ninja turtles.

She had gotten nearly all her stuff over to her aunt's apartment now, and she heaved a sigh as she thought of her and her aunt's trips to her old home. She had made sure not to touch any of her father's stuff, even refused to look at it. It would have hurt too much. So her aunt had taken care of cleaning up her father's stuff, so it wouldn't gather too much dust as long as the apartment was uninhabited.

Her aunt had agreed to pay for the apartment as long as April's father was gone, but given her financial situation, April had no idea how long she would be able to afford this. Maybe she should get a job, something for the weekends, so that she could help a little bit at the financial front front. Maybe she could do a paper route or something like that. She can't let her aunt handle this on her own.

Okay, April's free time had been nearly non-existent since the Kraang-incident. Sure, she still went to school, and anyone else would have thought she had all this free time after school, but that was just what it looked like on the outside.

In reality, April had been doing research on the Kraang all the time. That was what she was doing until late at night when her aunt started to remind her that it was time to go to bed like five times, before April finally obeyed – only to sneak back to her laptop or take it with her to bed as soon as she was sure her aunt was asleep. It was only total exhaustion that caused her to at least find some sleep at nights.

She didn't even find the time to do her homework. Under normal circumstances, that would have led to several lectures from her teachers by now, but they knew her situation, they knew that her father had disappeared, and so they had been going easy on the poor, traumatized child. That wouldn't last forever, though, but April would try to get out of it as much as she could as long as she could.

So she had no idea how she would squeeze in the time for a job, but she would think of something. At the moment, she needed to concentrate at the task ahead.

And this task was finding her father. And the key to that was finding the Kraang. Sure, they were good at keeping a low profile, their little alien bodies hidden in a robot's tummy, but the appearances of their robot bodies were limited. So far, April had only seen this business man-version. There might be others, but this was what she had to work with now. So her idea had been that it somehow would attract attention when there were identical triplets, quadruplets, or even quintuplets running around. And then there was that logo on the van that had helped the Turtles find her. So all she needed to do was gather information and thus be able to predict where the Kraang would strike next.

During her capture she had heard the Kraang mention something about getting equipment from labs. She had concluded that "getting" actually meant "stealing". The Kraang didn't seem to care much about laws, considering that they were kidnapping scientists, so "stealing" seemed to be the right translation of "getting" here. April had narrowed it down to look for abandoned labs or labs that would be closed soon, then. She had found some places that might be interesting for the Kraang, but just knowing where they _could_ strike, didn't tell her when they _were going to_ strike. So in order to get more information, she had set up a message board to collect unusual sightings around New York, and one section of this message board was dedicated to sightings of these strange business men, and so far, she had gotten quite a lot of feedback.

There was a silent knock on the window, and April knew immediately that it had to be one of her mutant friends. They had checked on her regularly after they had saved her. Well, Donnie, mostly, although Mikey and Leo had shown up here, too, once or twice. Only Raph hadn't checked on her since, and April wondered if that would mean that the red-masked turtle didn't like her, but it was okay. She couldn't force him to like her or show up here. But it still gave her heart a little pang.

But she decided that she would concentrate on the turtle that was here to see her.

So she went over to the window, opened it and greeted Donnie with a smile.

"You can come in," she explained as she stepped aside. "My aunt's at the movies and won't be back before later tonight."

"Okay," Donnie said, returning her smile and climbed inside.

He looked around her room. Sure, he had been here before, but somehow it still made him a little nervous to be in April's room.

April didn't notice or was gracious enough to pretend she didn't notice as she went back to her laptop. Donnie followed her.

"Oh, geography?" he asked as he spotted the map on her desk and a geography-textbook.

April looked at him confused, but then followed his gaze.

Oh, right, she had placed her geography-textbook on the desk to make it look like she was doing her geography-homework in case her aunt would come in. And if it managed to trick a ninja, she'd say, mission accomplished.

"Well, uhm, not really," she said as she had a seat. "I'm working on something more _extraterrestrial_ if you know what I mean." She winked at him.

But instead of blushing like he usually did when she winked at him or accidentally touched him, Donnie frowned at her.

"I guess, I do," he said. He knew April was eager to find her father, he just hadn't realized she had been actually _working_ on it. She hadn't mentioned it before. "So what have you been up to?"

"Well, I set up this message board," April explained and showed it to Donnie on her laptop. "And this section here is for sightings of these strange business men that all look the same aka the Kraang, but I can't say their real name in a message board. I had to go with a description before I was able to get a proper picture of one of them, though."

"Wait, what?!" Donnie's eyes widened in shock. "You went after them?!"

April looked at him slightly confused. "Well, someone mentioned in the message board that he had seen two of them, and it was close by, so I went there, snuck up on them and took a picture." She took her phone, activated the gallery, and showed Donnie the pic. "It was easy, really."

But Donnie's eyes grew even wider when he realized how close April must have been to take this picture.

"Have you totally lost it?!" he called out, making April flinch. "These guys tried to _kidnap_ you, and you have nothing better to do than _follow_ them?! Are you crazy?!"

April lowered her gaze to the ground, suddenly feeling intimidated by Donnie's outburst.

"But I had to do something," she mumbled.

Donne immediately cringed when he saw the sad look on her face and regretted his words. He took a deep breath.

"Look, April, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you," he said in a calm voice. "I just don't want these creeps to get you, okay?"

"…Okay."

"No hard feelings?" he asked cautiously.

"No hard feelings," April confirmed, finally raising her head to look at him. She knew what his worries were caused by. She wasn't trained in this, but this didn't mean she had to sit around and do nothing. And she would sneak up on a Kraang again in a heartbeat. She knew it. And she was pretty sure, Donnie knew it too. But they somehow made a silent agreement to let this matter pass.

"So, what's this?" Donnie asked and tapped on the map.

"Oh, this is where I record the sightings," April explained. "Still working on a digital version, so this has to do for now."

Donnie had a closer look at the map, trying to figure out what all these post-its in different colors meant.

April seemed to realize. "The blue ones are just random sightings," she explained. "The green ones are abandoned or soon to be abandoned labs that might be interesting for them. The yellow ones show when the Kraang are seen close to such a lab eventually, and the red ones mean that the Kraang had been spotted close to such a lab frequently, which usually means that they are going to break in there soon." She pointed at a part of the map that was simply plastered with red post-its. "I guess this is where they are going to strike next," she said. "The lab's still in operation this week, but it's going to be officially closed on Friday. So I think it's Friday night when they are going to strike. They usually strike the first night after the official closure. It's less suspicious that way, I guess. Neighbors might think they are still cleaning up the place or something like that."

Donnie looked from the map to April, back to the map, and then at April again.

"How did you…" Donnie just didn't seem to be able to finish this sentence. He was way too impressed to act normal.

"It's really easy," April said with a shrug. "When you know what you're looking for."

"But the labs, how do you know they are…" Again, he broke up mid-sentence. This girl was simply amazing.

"Abandoned? Closed?" April suggested, and Donnie replied with a nod. "As I said, it's really easy. 'Land register' and 'register of companies' are the magic words here."

"This is…" Donnie tried hard to pull himself together again. He was a genius, he needed to be able to finish a sentence, like, right now. "…amazing, April, this is amazing!" he burst out. "And you did this in just a few weeks?"

April nodded.

"Impressive!" he said approvingly which made April lower her eyes again and blush slightly.

"Thank you," she mumbled.

Donnie took a piece of paper and wrote down the address of said lab.

"We are going to take care of this," he said.

"Can I come?" April said immediately, but when Donnie looked at her, she knew the answer before he even pronounced it.

"April…," he started, another sentence he wasn't going to finish.

"Yeah, I know," April interrupted him. "Not trained in this. I get it."

"I…we just don't want you to get in any danger," he said apologetically.

"I know," April said. "But it's…hard to just sit around and do nothing."

"Nothing?" Donnie blinked a few times, disbelievingly. "April, you just found out where the Kraang are going to strike next. All by yourself! That's not _nothing_, actually, that's _a lot_!"

April looked at him again. He did have a point.

"Okay, you're right," she finally said. "But still…"

"We can talk about you coming with us another time, as for now, you're doing an amazing job here," Donnie said.

He grinned at her.

"Keep up the great work, _partner_!" he said and playfully punched her upper arm, being extra-careful to make it the slightest punch he could muster up.

"Okay, _partner_!" April said with a smile as she punched his upper arm in response, but as if she wanted to show him that she wasn't as fragile as he thought, she put a little force into her punch which made Donnie flinch the tiniest bit when she hit him. And this made April chuckle at her little revenge.


	4. Theories

_This chapter takes place before "Turtle Temper"._

* * *

**Chapter 04: Theories**

When Donnie had left, April had immediately gone back to her research again. But there weren't any news on Kraang-sightings in her message board, so she applied herself to another "project" she had been working on – the Kraang's motives. It was more like her thoughts on why the Kraang were here on Earth, where they came from, and such things. She couldn't really do a research on this topic. Not that she hadn't tried. But she hadn't been able to find anything online, to start with. And going to the library without knowing what exactly to look for seemed like a waste of time. Going through tons of pseudo-non-fiction books about extraterrestrial life would have been an idea if she had enough time for that, but actually, she hadn't. She was too busy tracking down the Kraang and finding her father. So she would have to save the pseudo-non-fiction for later, maybe.

So this was more about her thoughts on these topics.

It was clear that the Kraang were extraterrestrial. They didn't look human at all. Okay, they could be some creepy species that had lived on Earth for centuries, but somehow, April couldn't believe that. They were aliens, that was for sure. She only alternated between them being from another planet and being from a whole different dimension. But except for that, she didn't really think about the Kraang's origin.

As for their motives, that was a little bit more complicated. She had come up with two major plot-ideas. The first one was that the Kraang were trying to invade Earth, and they needed scientists to figure out weapons and strategies that would work best against humans.

The second one was that they were studying humans to find out if they could enslave them and put them to their home planet – or dimension. Two very nice scenarios to think of, indeed.

Well, maybe she was mistaken, and they were here just because they were curious about other beings and all the shooting at and kidnapping of people was because they didn't know anything about human laws. Or maybe they were shy that people would find out about them and thus wanted to get ahead of this by killing the people who saw them although it always broke their little alien hearts. Yes, and maybe they would send her dad back home soon with enough money in compensation for his capture that he could buy an island where he, she, and their mutant friends could live happily ever after. Oh, and maybe they could get Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny to switch dates, because April had always wanted Easter to take place in winter. It would be so much easier to find all these colored eggs when there was snow.

Yes, sure. April gave a bitter laugh. But she was surprised by how good it felt to be a little ridiculous.

Actually, she had given up on wasting one positive thought on the Kraang when they had taken her and her father captive. But thinking ridiculous and – in a dark kind of way – hilarious thoughts made her feel the tiniest bit better.

So she was down to these two scenarios. She opened the document where she had taken down her notes and reread them. The scenarios still made pretty much sense, but she had really struggled to make her dad fit in into these theories. She had understood why the Kraang needed scientists in both scenarios – for weapons, for figuring out how the human body worked, but her father wasn't such a scientist. He was a psychologist. So what would the Kraang want with a psychologist?

But after wracking her brain to find a solution for this riddle, she had come up with the following: Knowing about the human body was fair enough, but maybe they wanted to know something about the human mind as well. Maybe it helped developing strategies on how to conquer Earth and/or enslave its inhabitants. It was always good to know which weapons killed your enemy most effectively, but destroying your enemy's mind was even more effective sometimes and was not to be underestimated. So she had come up with the idea that they had taken her father to find out about the human mind and how humans would react to certain situations. It made sense.

Knowing why they had taken her father didn't bring him back faster, she knew that. But having an answer to the why helped her a little bit to deal with the situation, and it was much better than having to think that they had randomly picked her father and the answer to the why would have been that he had been at the wrong place at the wrong time.

So it has only been her who had been at the wrong place at the wrong time, but that was okay. If she hadn't been with him, she would never have found out about the Kraang, she would have thought her father would have been killed or that he had left her. And both were really bad thoughts to think. And she was glad she knew the truth.

And without her being at the wrong place at the wrong time she would never have met the Turtles. So maybe time and place hadn't been so wrong after all.

But before she could think more about it, a beeping sound informed her that something new had been posted in her message board.

_Time to look for some Kraang_, she thought and went back to work.

* * *

When Donnie arrived back home, he was greeted by Mikey in the living area.

"So, how's your _girlfriend_ doing?" the youngest turtle asked with a broad grin.

"She's doing fine," Donnie replied, watching around the room and only finding Raph sitting on the couch and watching TV. And then it hit him.

"And she's NOT my girlfriend!" he added quickly and a bit angrily.

"But you want her to be, right?" Mikey asked grinning even broader now. "Riiiiiiiight?"

Donnie growled silently. What was it that his brothers always made fun of him having a girlfriend? They knew it wasn't true. Okay, only Leo and Mikey had done that, Raph had somehow stayed out of it yet, well, he had stayed out of everything when it came to April so far. He hadn't checked on her or asked Donnie how she was doing, he hadn't even mentioned her, and Donnie could only wonder why.

He had his theories, though. Raph was the one among them who seemed not to trust April yet. While Donnie, Leo, and Mikey had felt bad about what had happened to April and wanted to protect her, Donnie wasn't so sure if the same was true for Raph. Raph was fine with things as long as they included hitting people and breaking stuff, so he had agreed to this whole rescue-mission. But Donnie thought there was more to it.

While Raph obviously had problems to trust anyone beside is family, he was very concerned when it came to his brothers and Splinter. Raph always felt like he had to protect his family. So another reason, why he had agreed on the rescue-mission, probably was that he could have an eye on his brothers, that he could protect them when they were in danger. Raph always felt guilty when one of them was hurt, although it wasn't his fault.

On one of their training runs in the sewers, back when they had been kids, Leo had broken his arm, and it had totally been Leo's fault because he hadn't paid attention to where he had set his feet and had fallen down a hole in the ground. While Mikey and Donnie had felt sorry for Leo, Raph had felt miserable, like he should have been there to make sure Leo wouldn't fall down that hole, although Raph had been in a different tunnel at that time. That was how Raph was – always feeling responsible for whatever bad happened to his brothers.

On the other hand, Donnie wasn't one-hundred percent sure about his "Raph's not trusting anyone besides his family"-theory. April had been the first human they had talked to, so maybe this wasn't true at all. Maybe Raph would trust the next human they came to know better without second thoughts, but somehow he had the feeling that would never happen. It just wasn't Raph-y enough.

And there was another _problem_ Donnie had figured out when it came to April and Raph. April would be one more person Raph had to worry about if he let her into his life. That had been the reason why he had been so surprised when Donnie had said that they would rescue April's father. For him, the mission had been over. They had rescued April, period. Not to waste another thought on it. But then they had given April this promise, and Donnie wasn't sure if Raph had been ready for this. He sure hadn't been too happy about it, although he had nicely saluted to April when they had left. But that had been their last interaction.

Maybe Raph just needed to get used to the thought that there now was someone else in their life. And when he had taken his time to do so, he and April would become friends. But for now, Raph simply ignored the fact that there was an April O'Neil out there. That would change someday, Donnie hoped. It just needed time.

"So, where's Leo?" he finally asked.

"In his room," Mikey replied.

"Okay, I need to talk to him." And with that Donnie began to move to leave the living area.

"Why?" Mikey asked, a teasing ring to his voice. "You need to tell him how awesome your _girlfriend_ is?"

"She is pretty awesome," Donnie said, lost in thought of April for a moment, but then jerked. "But she's NOT my girlfriend!"

"But you want her to be, right?"

"Can it, Mikey!"


	5. The Hothead and the Redhead

_Okay, we're still pre-"Turtle Temper" here, although this chapter anticipates what's going to happen in that episode a bit, especially Raph's anger issues. ;)_

* * *

**Chapter 05: The Hothead and the Redhead**

When Donnie arrived back home from visiting April on Thursday night, he seemed slightly sad. There was a little frown on his face and he couldn't stop thinking about April. Okay, he was thinking about her nearly non-stop anyway, but the difference now was, that he was _worried_.

Why hadn't he realized how pale she was earlier? What about the bags under her eyes?

From what he had realized tonight, she hadn't been sleeping properly in weeks. And had she even eaten? He wasn't so sure about that one. He remembered her bloodshot eyes and how she was shivering slightly although it wasn't even cold.

And now that he had realized, what was he supposed to do? Should he tell her? And if so, what exactly should he say? That she should get some rest? Why would she listen to him? She could say that she would go to sleep, but be back working on her computer the moment she was sure he had gone. That would be one-hundred percent April.

And how should he point out the obvious gently – that she looked a bit under the weather at the moment? Okay, actually _a lot_ under the weather, but that would be even more difficult to say.

Why, oh why hadn't he realized earlier?! Why had he been blinded by his crush on her so much that she had still looked like the most beautiful girl in the world to him when in reality her health was in danger? He _should_ have been able to notice! It was about April! He had promised to protect her. So how could he have missed _that_?!

Still brooding over April's momentary state of health, Donnie shuffled over to the pit where his brothers were sitting on the couch and watching TV.

"So, how's April?" Leo asked with a smile, but when he set eyes on Donnie, the smile faded away immediately.

"Yes, how's your…," Mikey started with a broad grin, and he was about to add the number one teasing-word aka "girlfriend", but stopped when he realized the look on Donnie's face. "…April?" he added in an attempt to finish the sentence, but then realized what he had just said. "Oh, I don't mean that she's _your_ April. I meant April in a general way, you know. Like…uhm…our April…ouch!" Mikey rubbed the back of his head and flashed Raph who had hit him to make this stupid babbling stop an angry glance.

Raph still didn't look at them. His eyes were glued to the TV, pretending anything else was more important than the actual conversation, something he had done all the time now when they had talked about April.

"Donnie, what's wrong?" Leo asked.

Donnie sighed and let himself slump down on the couch next to Leo.

"April," Donnie replied. "She looks so…tired like she hadn't been sleeping in weeks. I haven't realized earlier, and I know I _should_ tell her about it, but I don't know how. I think she is so eager to find her father that she's working non-stop on her computer to find the Kraang. I…I don't know what to do. She's working herself to the ground!"

Leo pondered about that for a moment. "I know it must be difficult to tell her something like that. Maybe you should try to tell her in a roundabout way? Although I have no idea how to do that."

"Me neither," Mikey said. "It's not like you could just tell that she looks terrible and should get some rest, especially not, when you want her to be your girlfriend one day."

"I guess I'll have to think of something," Donnie said, letting Mikey's mention of a girlfriend pass. He was too worried to be teased at the moment anyway. Besides, Mikey's voice had lacked the mocking tone anyway, so most probably that hadn't even been meant to be a teasing after all.

* * *

Later that night, April was cowering on her bed in front of her laptop and checking the new posts in her message board again. There weren't any interesting news, only some more posts that confirmed her theory about the Kraang making their move at this lab she had told Donnie about tomorrow. But maybe within the next thirty seconds, something incredible would show up, something that would tell her exactly where to find her father and how to defeat the Kraang.

Well, maybe within the next two minutes.

Or the next five minutes.

Or maybe…

She nearly fell of her bed when there was a knock on her window.

She quickly turned her head and looked over to it. And what she was seeing made her eyes widen in surprise. She had thought it could be Donnie again, or maybe Leo, or Mikey, but in no way had she thought of _him_.

"Raph?" she asked as she opened the window. "What are you doing here?"

"Seeing what you're up to," the red-masked turtle replied in a grumpy voice.

"I was about to go to sleep," April lied. She didn't even know why she lied to him. It seemed to have become a habit. It was what she told her aunt on the rare occasions she caught her working on her computer in the middle of the night. She usually said she had forgotten about an essay or so and that she was nearly finished and was about to go to sleep now.

"No, you weren't," Raph said. "You've been staring at your computer for fifteen minutes straight with no sign of getting to sleep soon."

"Wh…what?" April gasped for air. "You've been watching me!"

"I needed to be sure about something."

"About what?"

"About you spending your nights working on your computer. Looks like it's true."

He eyed her over for a moment. "You look horrible, you know that?"

April's eyes widened in shock. "What?"

"You heard me. When was the last time you've gotten a good night's sleep?"

"I…I…," April stammered, calculating roughly in her head, but then gave up.

"Oh? You can't even remember? Nice!" Raph said sarcastically. "I'd say you go get some sleep right now."

April crossed her arms over her chest. "No."

"No?!" Raph called out. "You know as well as I do that you HAVE to get some sleep! NOW!"

He glared at her, but April didn't move. She just stared back at him.

"No," she repeated in an all too calm voice. "I have to find my father."

"So do we!" Raph retorted. "But we don't drive ourselves to the ground because we know that we have to stay operational to do that. Do you think it would do your father any good if you work yourself into unconsciousness? How much a help would you be then if you're in coma?"

For the first time now, something flickered in April's eyes and for a moment it looked like the hard look on her face would finally break, but no, she wouldn't give in that easily.

"I have to find my father," she said again.

"Girl, you're stubborn!" Raph called out.

"And you're angry!" April countered.

"Why wouldn't I be?! Today Donnie came walking into the lair all worried about your wellbeing and how tired you look and so on, and now Leo and Mikey are worried too. We're all worried about you. Heck, we have more important things to do than checking on you if you get enough sleep, you know! LIKE FINDING YOUR FATHER!"

April cringed a little at his sudden outburst, and finally let her arms fall to her sides. The hard, stubborn look was gone from her face as she stared at Raph wide-eyed. He was worried?

Raph noticed the change in her appearance, feeling a little bit pleased that she finally had seemed to get it.

"Get some sleep, April!" he said again, but this time his voice was calmer. And then he pointed a finger at her. "Or else I'll be back!"

And with that he jumped up to the rooftop and was gone.

April was still standing there for a moment without moving. Despite his angry voice and uncommon choice of words, she had to admit, that he did have a point. She couldn't help them if the unhealthy way of life she was leading right now would finally charge its price and send her right to the hospital.

She closed the window again and marched over to her bed, picking up her laptop and carrying it over to her desk. But she simply had to check the new posts on her message board once more. And the moment she did, she could hear Raph's angry voice in her.

_Get some sleep!_

She laughed silently and shook her head. There weren't any new posts, so she finally shut the laptop down and went to bed.

But before she could drift into long-needed sleep, one thought was floating in her head.

_Raph is worried about me…_


	6. Fire Escape Talk

_This chapter takes place after "Turtle Temper" and before "New Friend, Old Enemy"._

* * *

**Chapter 06: Fire Escape Talk**

Something had happened, Donnie knew it. Raph had first mentioned April the morning before their mission April had predicted based on her great work. And by mentioning, Donnie meant Raph had joined Leo and Mikey in their teasing about Donnie's crush on April.

And although Donnie had been glad that Raph finally seemed to have opened up to the thought of letting April into his life, dealing with another teasing brother sure wasn't funny.

_I have reliable intel.  
Intel? You mean __April__ told you._

He could hear how Raph had emphasized her name, how Mikey had immediately jumped at the opportunity and had started teasing him, and how Raph and Leo had smirked over how funny Donnie was when he had tried to defend himself.

Donnie was glad that Raph had changed his mind about April, and he had wanted to ask Raph about this, but he had decided to let this matter pass and just be happy with the fact that Raph seemed to have accepted April.

Talking to Raph about emotions usually was tricky. It always involved the danger of awakening the angry beast. Raph had always had anger issues, but it never had been that bad like it had been on their mission last night – or the Spider Bytez-incident, how they called it now.

On the other hand, they never had had to deal with an angry Raph on a real mission. So far, they only had had to deal with Raph and his anger when they had been in the lair, during training or so. And back then, Splinter had always been close for damage control, something that had terribly been missing during the Spider Bytez-incident.

Not even Splinter's lecture after they had been caught on video had really calmed Raph down, although he had tried really hard to convince this guy to give them the video – well, really hard in Raph-terms.

And Donnie had understood when Leo had sent Raph home. And when Raph had joined them in the fight later, when this nasty guy had turned into Spider Bytez, Raph had done pretty well. So maybe he finally had gotten his anger under control.

But Donnie was sure that Raph would never get rid of his anger completely. How he had treated Mikey when he had called him a bloated buffalo again, had shown that. His anger was one of Raph's more charming character traits – like being a ruffian and getting into trouble head over heels.

Donnie had reached the rooftop of April's apartment building by now. With a smooth jump he landed on the fire escape in front of April's window. He peeked inside the room cautiously and found the teenage girl seated on her desk and working on her laptop. A small smile appeared on his face as he knocked on the window.

April jumped a little when she heard that and turned her head to look at the window. Donnie waved at her, and April returned the wave with a smile before she got up, walked over to the window and opened it.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," Donnie apologized.

"That's okay, "April said.

"Still sorry," Donnie said. He quickly examined April's face and he choked a sigh of relief when he realized that the bags under her eyes were gone. On the whole, she looked more vivid and rested than she had last time he had seen her.

So that was a good sign, he thought. She finally must have gotten some sleep.

"How did it go?" April asked.

"Good!" Donnie replied a little bit too quickly.

He chuckled insecurely. He sure wasn't ready to confess their failure to her yet. And they had failed. They hadn't been to find any information about her father's capture, on the contrary, they had been caught on video, had gotten themselves into deep trouble and had accidentally mutated a man. Okay, Donnie didn't use the adjective "innocent" on purpose here because this guy hadn't been innocent. He had tried to make money out of this video, a lot of money. And although Donnie was far from thinking that this nasty man had gotten what he had deserved, he couldn't ignore the irony in the fact that a man who had tried to make millions with a video of mutants had been turned into a mutant himself in the end.

April cleared her throat when Donnie didn't go on with his story, and now it was Donnie's turn to jump a little, and he realized that he didn't have a choice. He had to tell her.

"So did you find out where they keep my father?" April asked when Donnie still didn't say anything.

"Ah…uhm…no," Donnie admitted.

"Oh." April lowered her eyes.

"April, I'm sorry." Donnie looked at her empathetically.

"No, it's okay, Donnie," April said with a sigh and raised her eyes again. "We knew it was a slim chance."

"I know, but that doesn't mean I have to like it." Donnie sighed. "But on the plus-side, I guess we are getting better at fighting the Kraang, although we still have some problems fighting as a team."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, we've been trained all our lives to fight as individuals, so now we're still working out how to fight together most effectively. But we're getting the hang of it, I promise."

"I know what you guys can do, so if that is just _working it out_, I bet you're going to be one crack team soon."

"You think so?" Donnie asked, chuckling insecurely again and blushing slightly.

"I do," April confirmed.

There was a moment of silence in which Donnie tried to get the blushing under control.

"So, what else is going on in the Secret Sewer Squad?" April asked as she sat down on the window bench and pulled up her knees.

"Secret Sewer Squad?" Donnie asked with a smirk.

"Yes, I thought you might need a codename," April explained.

"Don't let Mikey hear that," Donnie said. "He loves naming stuff and he would be sad if he found out he hadn't come up with this himself."

"Oh, okay, it's our codename, then."

"Okay."

They looked at each other for a moment, until April spoke up again.

"So?" she asked. "Let me in on some details?"

Donnie cleared his throat. "Well…uhm…yeah. Where to begin? Well, we were caught on video and had to rescue the guy who made this video from the Kraang. But unfortunately, he was accidentally mutated during the fight, when he tried to get his precious phone aka the video of us back."

"Wow, that's…uhm…terrible."

"Not really. Well, I do feel sorry for him, but he wanted to make money out of the video, so I'm kind of glad he didn't succeed. It's difficult enough for mutants to live in this city without people knowing about our existence. Imagine how hard it would be if some curious wannabe scientists or hunters were after us. But the phone was destroyed, so there's no real proof of our existence which is a good thing."

"What happened to this new mutant?"

"He ran off." Donnie shrugged. "I guess we'll see him again eventually, although I won't mind if we had seen the last of him."

"And what exactly is he right now?"

"A gigantic, hideous spider. Mikey called him Spider Bytez."

"So not all mutants turn out like you and your brothers?" April asked. "I mean, you four are more human-like, but then there is this plant monster and now this mutant spider."

"Looks like it," Donnie said. "It's a topic I can only theorize about, and I have only seen a few mutants so far, not enough to base a proper theory on. For the moment, being mutated is more like a game of chance – or _mutation roulette_, how Raph would call it."

"I see," April said. "How's Raph doing, by the way?"

Donnie's eyes widened in surprise and he blinked a few times. Now he was totally sure that something had happened.

"He's fine, dealing with his anger issues, I guess," he said.

"Oh, yeah, I realized he has some anger issues."

"You realized? You mean you met him? Did I miss something?" Donnie couldn't help that his voice pitched. He was just too surprised by what he had heard.

"Didn't he mention?" April asked. "He showed up here two nights ago, telling me how terrible I looked and that I should get some sleep."

Donnie's jaw dropped. Raph had done _what_?!

Abril just shrugged and went on. "He did have a point, though. I _did_ look terrible. And hadn't slept in what felt like ages. Guess I needed to be told a little more firmly to get some sleep."

Donnie just raised a brow.

"Okay," April said with a chuckle. "A _lot_ more firmly."

"Sounds like something, Raph would do," Donnie said, still unsure what to think of it.

"His anger aside, I think he wanted to help me. I never thought he cared about me."

"Oh, that's the funny thing about Raph," Donnie explained. "He usually doesn't show when he cares about someone, and when he does, it always turns out to be in an angry way."

"Okay, I see," April said. "Would you please tell him my thanks?"

"Sure."

Well, he had no idea of how to bring this matter up with Raph, but he would think of something. At least, he now had a reason to talk to him about April. And he just wouldn't think of the danger of awakening the beast. He was just being the messenger here, his curiosity aside, and wasn't there a saying about not killing the messenger? He just hoped that Raph knew of that saying.

"I better get going now," he said then. "It's getting late."

"Okay," April said.

Donnie looked at her for a moment.

"Uhm, should I call you next time before I come over?" he asked cautiously.

April looked at him confused.

"I…uhm…don't want to startle you again," Donnie explained.

"Oh, that," April said. "No, you don't have to."

"But maybe I should. I mean, maybe next time one of your friends is over for a visit. It won't hurt to be sure."

April lowered her eyes for a moment and bit her lower lip. "No, Donnie, that's okay. I know how difficult it is for you to call me."

That was true and it reminded Donnie that he still needed to work on their telecommunications network in the lair, but that could take a while. They had April's number. She had given it to them and it now had an honored place on their fridge. But to call her, they had to grab some of the corners that had fallen through the grate, walk to an abandoned phone booth and call her. It was a bit difficult. So Donnie preferred to send her an e-mail or just show up at her place.

But somehow he had the feeling that this was about something else than saving them the trouble.

"April, what's wrong?" he asked.

"N-nothing," she replied. "I just know how difficult it is for you guys to call me."

"April." Donnie's voice had an urgent ring to it, and April finally looked up at him.

"What's wrong?" he added gently.

"It's just that…I…uhm…," April started and then took a deep breath. "It's just that I sort of keep my friends at distance at the moment. So there won't be one of my friends around in the near future."

"What happened?"

"Nothing, really. I mean they are really sweet and all, now that my father has disappeared," April explained. "It's just that I don't know what to talk to them about. I can't tell them what really has happened to my father. And I am afraid I could babble something out about you and your brothers. It's…difficult."

"I'm sorry," Donnie said empathetically and placed his big hand on April's small one, like he had done the night after they had rescued her from the Kraang.

And just like back then, April smiled at him.

"It's okay, Donnie," she said gently. "I found some new friends. And they are amazing."

Donnie's smile turned into a grin. "Thanks."

"Just telling the truth."

He took his hand away. "Bye, April."

"Bye, Donnie."

And then he turned around and left.

But on his way back to the lair, he couldn't help, but think about the sad look on April's face. She seemed to be lonely, and there was nothing he could do to change that.

Or wait, maybe there was! But he needed to talk to Splinter first.


	7. Persuading Sensei

_Okay, so that you know, we're still after "Turtle Temper" and before "New Friend, Old Enemy" here. ;)_

* * *

**Chapter 07: Persuading Sensei**

Later that night, when Donnie entered the lair again, he found his brothers and Splinter gathered in the living room and watching TV. Leo's favorite show was on – "Space Heroes". Donnie would never understand what was so awesome about this show, but Leo loved it. And Donnie usually kept his opinion to himself, as did Mikey. Raph was the only one who kept complaining about it. The funny thing was, Raph was the one who always was in the living room when the show was on for as long as the show was on. Kind of funny, and Donnie wasn't sure if Raph did that to tease Leo or if he actually liked the show and didn't want to admit it. Well, with Raph, you never knew.

But this wasn't about a TV show. It was way more important. And Donnie needed to talk to Splinter. Now.

For a moment, he pondered his options. He could talk to his sensei in private. That would give him the chance to pose the pros and cons of his idea. Well, the pros, mostly. But when he talked to Splinter right in the living room, he could find allies in his brothers. Okay, in Mikey, and maybe in Leo. Again, he wasn't sure about Raph.

Donnie frowned. One sure ally was better than none. And as long as Raph wouldn't be against his idea, he had good chances Splinter would allow it. And if he was right about Raph, his older brother would stay out of it anyway. _If_ he was right about Raph. He knew his brother all his life, but still, Donnie sometimes had troubles to predict Raph's actions. Raph was pretty predictable most of the time, especially when it came to fighting, but sometimes he was one big, green mystery. And this was one of these times. Like he had said before, with Raph, you never knew.

He inhaled sharply, straightened up and entered the lair. When he was walking over to Splinter, Leo addressed him.

"So, how's April, Donnie?" he asked, turning his head away from the TV.

But before Donnie could reply, Mikey chimed in.

"Yeah, how's your giiiiiiiiiiirlfriend?"

"Not now, Mikey!" Donnie said without looking at Mikey, his voice sounding a bit harsh and demanding.

This made Mikey's jaw drop, and his eyes widened in surprise. He sure hadn't expected that. Raph and Leo shared a confused look as well.

"Sensei, I need to talk to you about something," Donnie said when he had reached Splinter.

"What is it, my son?"

"Well…uhm…you see…"

_Damnit_, Donnie thought. He had been so sure about this, and now that he had to be all confident and self-conscious, he suddenly was fumbling for words.

"Yes?" Splinter asked, looking at Donnie with curious eyes.

Donnie took a deep breath.

_Just spit it out, Donnie!_

"Well…uhm…I was thinking if April could visit us here at the lair," he finally managed to say.

"What?" Splinter's eyes widened in surprise.

Donnie felt the "no" coming before his father could pronounce it, and he sure wouldn't want to let this happen.

"She's lonely, sensei," he explained. "And she has no one to talk to. Well, no one who knows the truth about what has happened to her father. And she's afraid she might give away any details about us, so she even avoids her friends. She's hurting, sensei, and she really could need her new friends now."

Splinter took a deep breath.

"Donatello, I appreciate your compassion. Your heart is in the right place. But we are talking about our secret lair here."

"Sensei, we saved her from the Kraang," Donnie went on. "We can't just leave her hanging now. She needs us."

And this time, he really meant "us", not "me", like he had when he had convinced Splinter about saving April. And right now, April needed a different kind of saving. And she needed him just as much as she needed his brothers. She needed all of her friends.

"Sensei, Donnie has a point," Leo said as he got up to his feet and took a stand next to Donnie. "April must be really lonely at the moment, and maybe having a place to go to and just be herself, being able to talk about what has happened, could help her to cope with the situation. She has lost her father."

"Yeah, besides, it would be great to have our new friend here at the lair," Mikey joined in the conversation. "That would be so awesome!"

Splinter just raised a brow and looked from Mikey to Leo to Donnie. And then he looked over at Raph, and Donnie, Leo, and Mikey followed suit.

And suddenly, Raph found himself the center of attention. His eyes widened and he looked from one brother to the next in a slightly panicked way before his face turned all grumpy again and he crossed his arms over his plastron. He looked to the side, so he didn't have to face his brothers or his sensei.

"Do whatever you want," he grumbled.

Donnie let out the breath he just realized he had been holding and he, Mikey, and Leo turned back to Splinter.

Splinter closed his eyes and stroked his beard like he usually did when he was thinking.

"You might bring her here, Donatello," he suddenly said without opening his eyes, but before Donnie could cheer, Splinter opened his eyes again and looked directly at Donnie.

"But," he continued with a wagging finger, "you have to blindfold her and make sure she doesn't know the way to the lair until I decide that she is trustworthy."

Donnie could tell him now that April sure was trustworthy and that he had no doubt about that, he even felt the urge to tell him so, but he fought his words back before they could leave his mouth and instead just turned all serious and bowed.

"Hai sensei!"

But deep inside himself he couldn't help, but cry out in joy.

Oh, he couldn't wait to tell April!

* * *

On their way to their rooms when Splinter had sent them to bed, Raph was trotting in front of Donnie. Mikey and Leo had already disappeared into their rooms, so Donnie was alone with Raph in the aisle.

He frowned for a moment. Yes, he had promised April that he would tell Raph her thanks, but on the other hand, she could tell him herself soon enough when she visited the lair for the first time. But who knew if Raph was going to be in a talking mood then or if he would even talk to April with the others around?

Donnie shook his head slightly. A promise was a promise.

"Uhm, Raph?"

Raph stopped immediately, looking back at Donnie over his shoulder. "Yeah?"

"Well…uhm…April asked me to…tell you her thanks for talking some sense into her the other night."

Raph narrowed his eyes, pressing his mouth into a hard line.

"Don't mention it," he grumbled.

"I…I didn't know you showed up at her place," Donnie continued. "You didn't tell us."

"I don't have to tell you everything all the time," Raph retorted.

"True." Donnie nodded. "But you could have told us, you know that, right?"

Raph answered with a shrug. "Who cares, anyway?" And with that he marched over to his room.

A slight smile appeared on Donnie's face.

_You do, Raph._


	8. First Visit

_Moth165 asked if I am going to write about Mikey and Bradford in the next chapter, and yes, I guess so. :)_

_Still between "Turtle Temper" and "New Friend, Old Enemy", in case you didn't notice. ;)_

* * *

**Chapter 08: First Visit**

"We're going round in circles, right?" April asked.

"How do you…," Donnie started, then cleared his throat. "I…I mean, why do you think that?"

"Because I think it's the third time I nearly tripped over this stone here," April replied, prodding said stone with her foot.

"I…have no idea what you're talking about," Donnie said, but of course April was right.

He was leading her around the sewers in circles, making sure she would never figure out where exactly he was leading her, trying to confuse her.

"I'm sorry about the nearly-tripping, though," he added with an insecure smile.

But April couldn't see it. She was blindfolded which totally explained why she was nearly tripping over stones although there was enough light in the tunnel. Donnie had suggested carrying her, but April had refused, saying that although she was blindfolded, there was nothing wrong with her legs, and thus ruined Donnie's daydreams about holding her in his arms again.

But Donnie had wrapped an arm around her torso while he was holding her by the wrist with his other hand, trying to give as much support and guidance she needed. And that was nearly as good as holding her in his arms. He was close to her nonetheless, although he kept getting swept away by her scent and her body warmth which led to him forgetting to warn her about a stone on their way every now and then – or the same stone three times in a row.

But so far, he thought he was doing a pretty good job. April hadn't fallen over and whenever she tripped he caught her, but his heart kept pounding in his chest like crazy and he kept thinking that she must hear it.

Well, if she did, she carried it off well.

Donnie took a calming breath, leading April down another tunnel. Only this one tunnel, then another turn to the left, leading her round in a circle just once more and then they would be there, at the lair.

When they were going down the tunnel, April wrinkled her nose.

"Sorry," Donnie said. "The smell is a bit worse in this part of the tunnel system."

"Nah, that's okay," April said. "I knew what I was getting myself into, with the lair being in the sewers and all. Although I'm a bit regretting now that I didn't bring this clothes pin like I had originally planned. But I thought it wouldn't go with the rest of my outfit and ruin my great entrance."

She smirked, and Donnie couldn't help, but chuckle.

"I'll make a mental note to ask you about which color you'd prefer for the blindfold next time," he said. "Don't want to ruin your outfit."

"Very obliging," April said.

For a moment, they walked in silence.

"So, about our sensei…," Donnie started, but was interrupted by April.

"Mutant rat, was human before that, originally from Japan, address him as Master Splinter, bow, not shake his hand," she said quickly.

Donnie looked at her slightly startled.

"Did I miss something important?" she asked.

"No," he replied, slightly startled.

""Oh, good, then I finally got it after you told me, like, one-hundred times." She smirked again.

"I just want him to like you, you know."

"I do, and I appreciate your concern, but you worry too much."

"Maybe," Donnie said, but then stopped and thus bringing April to hold as well.

"But anyway," he said and removed her blindfold, "we're here."

April blinked a few times until her eyes had adjusted to the light and then looked around curiously. What she was seeing in front of her looked like the entrance to an old subway station. Donnie beckoned over to the turnstiles and she followed him there, pushing herself through, and suddenly the place didn't look like a subway station any longer, although it still had that appeal, but like a real home. There was a pinball machine and a TV and some sort of a couch, and it wasn't as cold here as she had expected. It didn't even smell like sewers here.

"Aaaaaaaaaapril!" Mikey called out cheerfully, and before April could react, the youngest turtle had flung his arms around her and was squeezing the air out of her. "It's so good to have you here!"

"Th-ank you," she uttered.

Mikey let go of her and looked at her with big blue eyes.

"Did you bring me something?"

April frowned. Of course! Weren't guests supposed to bring a little present? How could she have forgotten?

"I…I…, she stammered.

"Mikey!" Donnie reproached his brother. "April is our guest."

"So?"

April quickly rummaged around her messenger bag. There had to be something she could give Mikey.

"Well, I have this voucher for a free pizza at Antonio's," she explained as she held up the voucher. "And I think it works for delivery as well."

Mikey gasped, snatching the voucher from April's hand. "You're the best! Thank you!"

"You're welcome," April said with a smile, watching Mikey dancing around the room and repeating "Free pizza, free pizza!" all the time in a chirping voice.

Donnie placed a hand on her shoulder and guided her over to the pit where the two remaining turtles were waiting. Leo had just gotten up from his sitting position in front of the TV.

"Hi April!" he said with a smile.

"Hi Leo!" she replied and then set eyes on Raph who was sitting on the couch, his arms crossed over his chest, with a grumpy look on his face. He unfolded his arms just for a second to wave at her casually, but kept his eyes glued on the TV.

April waved back with a smile nonetheless and then turned her head to look what was on.

"Oh, is that 'Space Heroes'?" she asked.

"You know it?" Leo's voice pitched immediately.

"Sure do. My father and I watch it all the time." She frowned and lowered her eyes. "Used to watch it, I mean," she corrected herself.

Donnie and Leo shared a concerned look.

"So who's your favorite character?" Leo asked quickly, trying to get April's thoughts away from her father.

"Oh, that's a tough question," April replied, but the frown on her face was gone when she looked up again, and Donnie choked a sigh of relief when he saw that. "I really like Captain Ryan, but Dr. Mindstrong is a great character, too."

Leo pointed to the couch, and he, April, and Donnie sat down while Mikey continued his Free Pizza-dance, and knowing Mikey, this could last a while.

"Who's your favorite character, Leo?" April asked.

"Captain Ryan!" he replied quick as a shot. "He's brave and intelligent and heroic and…"

Raph just groaned.

So Leo and April were talking about "Space Heroes" for quite a while, and Donnie, since he was lacking most of the background knowledge, was forced to listen, but he didn't really care.

April's eyes were sparkling while she and Leo exchanged some theories on a device that had been invented by Dr. Mindstrong in one episode. Donnie had no idea what this device was, he couldn't remember having seen this episode. But that was okay. April was smiling, and that was what really mattered to him.

Mikey had eventually ended his Free Pizza-dance and had joined them on the couch, although he was just listening like Donnie.

"So our guest is already here?" they were suddenly addressed, and Leo, Mikey, and Donnie flinched as they turned their heads and looked at Splinter. They had been so caught up with talking/listening, they had completely forgotten about telling Splinter that April had arrived. Raph, though, didn't even turn away from the TV.

April looked at Splinter, and her eyes widened a little, although she quickly got a hold on herself. She kind of was getting used to this meeting mutants-thing.

"April O'Neil, I presume," he said, his face looked emotionless as he was eyeing her over, but the tone in his voice wasn't unfriendly.

April nodded and got to her feet.

"Welcome to our home, Miss O'Neil," he said, a flicker of a smile on his face.

"April, please," April said as she bowed a little, feeling quite awkward while doing so. "Thanks for having me."

"You're welcome," Splinter said, again with just the idea of a smile on his face. "If you don't mind, I would like to speak to you in private."

"Of course!" April replied.

"Very well, I'll be awaiting you in the dojo. Meet me there whenever you are ready."

And with that he turned around and left for the dojo.

April looked over to her friends who gave her encouraging smiles, well, three of them at least. Raph was still watching TV.

"You better go now," Donnie said. "It would be rude to keep sensei waiting."

She nodded, but then frowned.

"The dojo is over there," Raph said quickly, without looking at her, pointing into the direction. "Up the stairs, can't miss it."

"Thanks!" April said and flashed Raph a smile, but again, he didn't look at her, and she was wondering how he could have caught her confusion and immediately could have given her the right answer to her unpronounced question, without even looking at her.

* * *

April cautiously peeked inside the dojo through the entrance and found Splinter kneeling next to the tree.

_Wow, a tree_, April thought, her eyes widening in surprise. _Beautiful!_

But then she remembered why she was here and entered the dojo.

Splinter who had had his eyes closed opened them and looked at April.

"Please," he said, motioning to her to sit down in front of him.

April got down on her knees rather stiff and uneasy, and her feet immediately started prickling. She probably had blocked the blood flow when she had knelt down because she was unused to this position. The heels of her boots were digging into her backside, and she felt really uncomfortable. She pressed her hands on her thighs and shifted a little, but that didn't really make it better.

"You can sit in whatever position is comfortable for you," Splinter said.

Damn, he had noticed.

"No, this is fine," April said, but the forced smile on her face belied her.

"Very well," Splinter said, and April was glad that he let this matter go. She sure didn't want to discuss sitting positions with him.

"First of all, I want to let you know that you have my deep sympathy for what has happened to you and your father," Splinter went on. "I can imagine how hard this must be for you."

"Thank you," April said, biting her lower lip.

"I'm sorry for bringing up bad memories, I just wanted to let you know," Splinter said. "And I apologize for the circumstances of your arrival here. I guess living in the shadows for fifteen years has made me overcautious."

"No, that's okay," April said. "I understand."

Splinter nodded slightly.

"And I wanted to get to know the girl better that had grown close to my sons in such a short time," he continued. "So what is there, people should know about you, April?"

April lowered her eyes. "My name is April O'Neil, and my father was kidnapped by alien brains in robot bodies."

Oh great! _That_ was the first thing she could come up with?

"And again, I am sorry for what has happened to you," Splinter said. "But I am sure there is more one should know about you. So what do you love to do in your free time?"

"Oh, at the moment, I spent most of my free time trying to find the Kraang. You see, I set up this message board where people can post about unusual sightings around New York. I don't know if Donnie has told you, but because of this I could tell them where the Kraang were going to strike next. It is really helpful, and I thought that if…"

Splinter gave a little smile when April lifted her hands from her thighs and started gesticulating to emphasize certain thoughts. There was a vigor and determination in her voice and her eyes were sparkling.

He was glad that, although she was still talking about the Kraang, most of her sadness seemed to be gone.

* * *

The brothers were still gathered in the living room, trying their best to overhear the conversation in the dojo, but all they could hear were distant murmurs. But then the murmurs ended and they heard approaching footsteps.

Splinter entered the living area again, followed by April who was a little wobbly on her legs and stomped her feet every two steps to get the blood flowing again and make the numb feeling disappear, and it finally seemed to work.

"Donatello, please see April home," Splinter addressed his son.

Donnie nodded and got up, looking forward to guiding April to the sewers again. It would mean he could hold her close to him again.

"And Donatello," Splinter went on, "no blindfold this time."

Donnie's eyes widened, but then he grinned from ear to ear. Okay, that meant he couldn't hold April close again, but it meant something way more important, namely, that Splinter trusted her. And that made him grin even broader.

"Can I join you?" Mikey asked. "Maybe April would be so kind to redeem the voucher she gave me earlier, and we can have pizza for dinner."

"Of course!" April said with a smile.

Leo got up as well. "I'll come too. I'm afraid Mikey might eat the pizza before you two get back here."

But when Raph stood up too, all eyes turned on him.

"What?" he said with a shrug. "Leo has a point."

They all shared a look and then turned to leave the lair.

Splinter watched them and when they were outside in the tunnel, a warm smile appeared on his face.


	9. Her Friendship

_This chapter takes place after "New Friend, Old Enemy" and gives a bit of Donnie's thoughts on what has happened in the episode._

* * *

**Chapter 09: Her Friendship**

_Mikey, you already have a human friend. Me!  
April, you don't count. We saved your life, you have to like us._

After all the fiasco Mikey had caused by being so eager to find a human friend, this little part of his and April's conversation has kept floating around in Donnie's head, like a song on replay.

As if he hadn't anything else to think about – Chris Bradford knew of their existence, and because of that, Shredder, their sensei's mortal enemy, knew about them, too. So the worst things, the really important, life-changing fights were still ahead of them. And from what they have heard of Shredder, this guy would stop at nothing to have his revenge. And all this because Mikey couldn't stop being a goofball and trying so hard to make new friends, that _he_ wouldn't stop at nothing to achieve this goal. Even if meant risking his own life, risking his brothers' lives, forgetting about anything else that mattered just to be some human's friend.

Donnie shook his head. In a way, it was kind of admirable that Mikey still believed that he could be friends with humans after all that had happened to them, but on the other hand, Mikey was being naïve. But still, there were moments, Donnie envied him for being able to see good in everything, for being able to be carefree, to stop thinking about worst case-scenarios for a moment – or maybe all of the time –, for just being able to be. It must be fun inside Mikey's head where everything was about pizza, and little cats, and rainbows, and video games, and skateboarding most of the time.

Well, each of his brothers had a character trait, Donnie admired, and with Mikey, it was his carefreeness.

And maybe it was this carefreeness that let him think of April's friendship as granted, but oh, Mikey was so wrong about this! April's friendship was a gift, the most awesome gift Donnie could think of. And he would always appreciate it with all his heart. Her friendship was and would always be a gift he wasn't sure, he, no, _they_ deserved. It was given freely, and she could just as easily withdraw it again. And this made it even more precious for him.

There were no strings attached. Yes, they had saved her, and she was thankful for that, maybe she'd always be. But that didn't mean she had to like them. One could be thankful without befriending their saviors.

April liked them because she wanted to. She had decided that these four green mutants were worth her friendship, and Donnie would do all in his strength to stay worth it.

Maybe what Mikey had meant was that he wanted to go out there and actively search for new friends. And they all knew now how dangerous that was. Maybe that had been the reason Splinter had allowed it at first. Maybe he had thought Mikey had to make his own experiences, but that didn't change anything about the fact that they had been _lucky_ this time. Bradford hadn't informed the media about mutant turtles living in New York. He maybe had done this because of Shredder, to grant his master his revenge, but someone else could have chosen otherwise, could have trapped Mikey and sold him to a lab or something like this.

It was almost unbelievable how Shredder's feud with Splinter had saved them this time, although it would lead to way more trouble in the future. But for now, they were safe – thanks to a feud that was older than they were, thanks to Shredder's hate.

Oh, how everything was connected! This was a connection of hate, yes, but still a connection, and it had saved them in a way.

Donnie let himself slump down on the couch next to April. Since her first visit here a little while ago, she showed up at the lair nearly every day – another proof for him that she was enjoying their company.

She even ate dinner with them every now and then or brought a pizza herself and yes, at one of these occasions he had secretly taken the picture of her with his laptop that he now used as a desktop image. Luckily, he had thought of loading up another desktop image as well and thank goodness, he had been able to switch to it, when April had asked him if she could see his laptop to show Mikey this social media-site. That would have been quite embarrassing otherwise.

He looked her over for a moment – long enough for him to appreciate every inch of her appearance, but short enough that she wouldn't get suspicious.

She was seated cross-legged, balancing her laptop on her legs and tapping away.

But although a little frown was wrinkling her forehead, she seemed relaxed. The bags under her eyes were gone since Raph had paid her a visit the other night and hadn't come back ever since. So she at least seemed to get enough sleep. And being able to visit the lair, to spend time with her new friends who knew the truth about her father, sure had contributed to her well-being. A little smile appeared on Donnie's face before he addressed her.

"Another Kraang-search?" he asked curiously, peeking over her shoulder.

"No," April replied with a sigh. "Homework."

Donnie only nodded as he realized she was writing an essay. But she had scrolled down so he couldn't see the title.

"Looks like I've finally lost my 'poor little girl who has been abandoned by her father'-bonus at school," she continued. "I now really have to do my homework or else I might get into trouble."

"I see," Donnie said. "Can I help?"

April turned away from her laptop with a raised brow and flashed Donnie a slightly angry look, her mouth pressed into a thin line.

"Do you think I'm so stupid that I can't do my homework on my own?" she asked.

This made the warning bells ring in Donnie's head, their sound piercing through his brain as the red lights flashed all over his vision.

_Danger! Danger! Risk of losing her friendship!_

"I…I…I," Donnie stammered, eyes widened in shock. "I didn't mean you're stupid! On the contrary, you're intelligent, super-intelligent, a genius!"

And suddenly the angry look on April's face broke as mischief sparkled in her eyes. And then she exploded with laughter.

Donnie just watched this confusedly.

"Sorry! The…the look on your face!" April managed to gasp.

"Happy to contribute to your amusement," he said when she had finally calmed down.

"Sorry!" April said again, gently touching his arm with her hand which made him blush.

"I was just kidding!" she explained. "You should know me better than that!"

She thought about that for a moment.

"Or you'll come to know me better than that," she corrected herself. "I'm sorry. And I'd really appreciate your help if you still want to help me."

"Of course!" Donnie said and leaned in a little closer as April turned her laptop a bit so that he could have a good look at the screen.

"See, it's about photosynthesis," she explained and Donnie nodded. "I'm not sure if what I wrote here is coherent. I tried to look at it from a different angle, giving my thoughts on why plants started to use photosynthesis in the first place…"

And while she went on with her explanations, Donnie watched her from the corner of his eye.

Yes, her friendship was a gift, a gift he wanted to be worthy of all his life.


	10. Grounded

_This chapter takes place during/after "I Think His Name Is Baxter Stockman" and anticipates a bit what is going to happen in "Metalhead" – and "Monkey Brains", for that matter. ;)_

* * *

**Chapter 10: Grounded**

_You're grounded for a week!_

While Splinter's decision annoyed Donnie a lot, he still was sure he could deal with it a lot better than his brothers could. After all, he had all these neat little projects he was working on, and now, he would have the time to finish them.

So these were his thoughts as he closed the door of his lab behind him. Should the others – and especially Mikey, since he was the one responsible for the punishment – complain about how bored they were, he would make the best out of it.

And with that he rifled through all the broken, half-finished, and nearly finished items on his workbench.

Where should he begin?

He pondered over an old, broken radio which he had thought of repairing or maybe turning into something completely different. Maybe he could use some parts of it for a radar system? Or what about a hi-fi system? Oh, the possibilities!

But after a few moments he shoved the radio aside as something even more interesting caught his eye.

The A.I. chip he had found on the military junkyard the other day! Now wasn't that something he could turn into something very useful?

His trip to the military junkyard had been so much fun, he never got why his brothers refused to join him – or when they did they kept complaining on how long they would have to stay. How could someone want to leave an interesting place like a military junkyard? It was like…like Disneyland! A place full of possibilities and magic, in a way. Yes, magic, although he meant the rational version, the one where you could find little treasures among all this junk.

Really, how could someone _not_ get excited at a place like this? He just didn't get it. Okay, he didn't get his brothers most of the time. They just weren't interested in the stuff he liked. Maybe he should find someone who would _love_ to join him on his junkyard trips. Or maybe he already had. April seemed to be into technological, scientific stuff. Maybe he could ask her if she wanted to join him next time. It would be a great chance to spend more time with her.

But spending time with April was so important to him, that he really wanted to maximize his chances. He had to think of any of her possible replies, of any counterarguments, of simply _anything_, so that in the end, they would spend some time together.

Hmmm, maybe he should make a flowchart where he could write down all the possible scenarios in which he could spend time with April. He really wanted to hang with her more often, but he needed to be prepared. And flowcharts always worked. Plus, they were so much fun to make. He nodded. Yes, he would make a "Hang With April"-flowchart. It was settled.

But first things first, he thought, as he looked down at the A.I. chip again. What new task could this thing fulfill? What could it be turned into in his second life?

He saw the radio from the corner of his eyes and smiled.

* * *

The day after they had defeated Baxter Stockman and come through randori – although Donnie's limbs were still hurting a little from that – Donnie was in his lab, unscrewing the old radio.

He had meant to keep himself busy, but he somehow lacked the usual energy. There was something that bothered Donnie. His newest invention had been meant to be the most advanced music player in the world, but instead it had been used by a maniac to upgrade his powered battle armor. Baxter had attacked people and brought them into serious trouble.

Donnie sighed. So his inventions could be used to hurt people, and this hadn't been his intention. He didn't want bad guys to use his devices.

"Hi guys!" he could hear April's voice from the lair's entrance. "Pizza's here!"

"Oh, yeah!" Mikey's cheerful voice reached his ear.

Donnie knew he should get up now and greet April and eat, but he didn't feel like doing it. He wasn't even hungry although he only had breakfast. But still, he should get up now.

The moments passed, and he still couldn't get himself to do so. And then suddenly April popped her head into the lab through the open door.

"Donnie?" she asked carefully.

"Oh, hi April!" he said, flashing her a smile, but it didn't feel as warm as his usual smiles for her did, but he hoped she couldn't see the difference.

"You okay?" she asked immediately – and thus ruined his hopes.

"I am fine," he lied.

"Really?" she asked again as she came closer, and he nodded which made her frown.

"I think you're lying," she said finally.

Donnie marveled at how good she already knew him in this short time. She was looking him over, her eyes piercing into his as the frown on her forehead deepened.

"Okay, you got me," he finally admitted.

"Thought so!" April said, her voice sounding a little triumphant, but then she looked sympathetically at him. "What's wrong?"

"Well, I thought about my latest invention, the T-pod."

He gave a short explanation on what had happened with April listening closely.

"Well, and then I started thinking about how my inventions could be used by bad guys," he ended his story. "And it really bothers me."

April nodded. "I see."

A moment of silence passed until April spoke up again.

"But I think that's the problem all great inventors have to face," she said. "Some inventions were meant to do mankind good and then ended up being used for something to harm people, like…" – she thought of a good example – "…like nuclear power, for example. It can be used to produce power, which is good. But it can be used for a nuclear bomb as well, which is bad." She looked at Donnie and smiled. "Donnie, inventions always provide the opportunity to be used in a bad way. But think of all the things that wouldn't have been invented if the scientists would have thought like you do right now. Don't let this stop you."

"You have a point," Donnie admitted.

"I know," April confirmed. "Besides, you're a genius, and I am pretty sure that if something goes wrong, you'll immediately think of something else to make up for it."

"I would at least try," he replied, but April smirked at him. "Okay, okay, I will," he added with a grin

"Good," April said. "Now…" She was interrupted by Donnie's stomach growling so loud even she could hear it.

"Now let's get you some pizza," she added, chuckling.

"Sounds like a plan." Donnie grinned and got to his feet, and they both left his lab.

But he thought about April's words a little longer, and she did have a point. Inventing things was what he did best. It was so _him_. And nothing should be able to stop him from being himself.


	11. And Then There Was Metalhead

_This chapter deals with the episode "Metalhead"._

* * *

**Chapter 11: And Then There Was Metalhead**

If April had known that her words would lead to Donnie snatching one of the Kraang's empty robot bodies at the first opportunity that arose, she maybe would have reconsidered her words. Or maybe not. It was about Donnie here. And who knew how long he had been thinking about these robot bodies, how they worked, what they were built of, and so on? It was _Donnie_! He wanted to get to the bottom of simply anything.

So maybe he would have brought this robot body home even if she had told him that he should stop inventing things that could be used by villains. It was so Donnie to do something like that. And why should she have told him that anyway? That was like wanting to change him and she was far from that.

And it had been fun to see how excited he had gotten over the Kraang-droid, like a little child on Christmas Day.

April had been tapping away on her laptop, working through the new posts she had gotten on her message board, but Donnie's excitement had been a little amusing – as had been the talk between Donnie and Splinter when Donnie had asked if he could upgrade his weapon. Splinter usually was all calm and serious on the outside, but this conversation had shown April once more what a good sense of humor he had.

And when Donnie had dragged the droid into his lab and locked himself in, April had been pretty sure they wouldn't see him again anytime soon. Once Donnie was caught up in a project, there was nearly nothing that could make him stop working. He hadn't even realized when she had left the lair, something he otherwise would never miss. At least her little dispute with Leo usually would have gotten her his attention, but he hadn't heard anything.

It had been the first time she had been angry at Leo. How could he even have thought that she would stand back when this could be about her father?! And he had backed away rather easily. He at least seemed to have understood that there were moments, he better didn't get into her way. Yes, he had tried to reason with her, and yes, he maybe even had a point (or two or three), but this was about finding her father! Nothing would have stopped her at that moment.

She sighed. _Dad…_

Her thoughts drifted off to her father, and she felt her eyes prickle, but she quickly pushed these thoughts into the back of her head and rubbed over her eyes with her hand. There were more important things to do at the moment. She could go all melancholic and sad later, but now, she had to concentrate on the task ahead.

She quickly ducked into the shadows as she got closer to the warehouse that had been marked in her message board as the source of the video of this ominous gas explosion and a Kraang-droid. And then she heard the familiar mechanic clinking. She would recognize this sound anywhere. She peeked around a corner and found the source of the sound – a Kraang droid. She quickly checked her surroundings, and yes, it was only one.

She took a deep breath before she snuck up to some crates, hiding behind one of them, and looked closely as the Kraang-droid walked to the warehouse-door.

"Okay, Kraang-creep," she muttered as she watched closely how it pushed some buttons on a keypad next to the door. The door slid open and the droid walked inside. "Lead the way."

And with that, using every cover she could find, she ran over to the warehouse. There had to be another way inside, one some clumsy robot bodies couldn't use. And she would find it.

Things were getting real.

* * *

How real they just got, April realized when she heard the Kraang talking about poisoning the city's water supplies with unstable mutagen.

And luckily, thanks to her "Think ninja! Think ninja!"-attitude she had been able to trick the Kraang and get out of the warehouse undetected.

Then she had met the guys – well, three of them and Donnie's robot – in an alley and told them about the Kraang's plans.

And then, although she didn't like it, she and Metalhead had been put on the sidelines.

Oh, she hated this, but there wasn't much she could do. Fighting wasn't really her thing, she had to admit. Investigating was okay, and yes, she knew a few tricks thanks to hanging with ninjas all the time, but a real fight was beyond reach.

And there they were now, watching the warehouse closely. Well, she was watching closely. Donnie thought she wouldn't recognize that he was watching her through Metalhead.

She _knew_ he was watching her. And when she turned her head in his direction, she found him staring, although he quickly turned his robot head away.

That was another Donnie-thing – acting a little awkward around her. She thought it had something to do with the fact that he had never been around people, much less girls his age. And while his brothers had no problem with her being around them, Donnie was different. She had noticed that he seemed to have a little crush on her, but it was just a crush, nothing serious. It would wear off. Crushes always did. She knew from experience. So she had decided to act as if she hadn't noticed anything. Although she had to admit, his behavior sometimes was kind of cute.

But today it was annoying and she rolled her eyes. They were on a mission, okay, on the sidelines of a mission, but still.

_Pull yourself together, Donnie!_

She felt him watching her again, but she didn't react. And then she heard him laugh insecurely.

"So," – he laughed again awkwardly – "you like heavy metal?"

_Donnie, seriously?!_

And while the fight started moments later – she knew because of the sound of laser-shots coming from inside the building – Metalhead looked at her again. She could feel it.

And then she heard Donnie's gentle voice.

"Look at her, she's so beautiful. On this monitor she can't tell I'm staring."

This was the moment when she thought it was time she made Donnie snap out of it.

So she turned and looked into Metalhead's eyes, knowing it would be for Donnie as if she looked him right into the eyes.

"You do know that's not muted, right?" she said.

Then she heard Donnie scream and there was his insecure laugh again.

"Of course! I mean if it was muted, you couldn't hear me joking," came Donnie's voice from Metalhead.

After that, she had to cover her ears as Donnie used the megaphone.

"Man, I hope she bought that!" he screamed.

"That's the megaphone!" she commented, her ears still covered.

"I know!" He was still on the megaphone, but then finally, Metalhead's mouth flipped shut, and Donnie's voice was sounding normal again – well, as normal as it could sound, although it had a metallic ring to it, thanks to Metalhead.

"So, how do you think the fight's going?" he asked as he turned his attention back to the building.

But that moment, a laser-shot hit the balustrade and they were hurled backwards on the rooftop.

"Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp! They're everywhere! Ruuuuuuuuuuuun!" they could hear Mikey's panicked voice.

"Not great!" she said.

She could see how Donnie was wracking his brain. Okay, she couldn't really see it because there was only Metalhead in front of her, but she knew it. He was thinking of what he should do now. And there was only one thing he could do.

"You stay here!" he said. "I have to help them."

And she only managed to nod before he took off.

* * *

The fight still hadn't gone great, especially not after a Kraang had taken over Metalhead. So Donnie, the real Donnie, had joined the fight. April had caught a glimpse of him running to the building. And after Donnie had defeated Metalhead and they had won, the four had gotten back to her.

April realized immediately that Donnie's stick, no, "bō" was the correct term, she knew now – one of the perks of hanging with ninjas – well, his bō was broken again. He seemed a little depressed, but April couldn't talk to him because Mikey was filling her in on the details of what had happened in his excited voice, making his own sound effects. Mikey's "We Kicked Some Kraang-Butt"-show went on for all the way back.

When they reached an alley close to her aunt's apartment, they said good-bye to her, and so she didn't have a chance to talk to Donnie.

She was sure he was depressed because one of his inventions had been used by their enemies again.

So she sent him an e-mail once she was home, asking if he was doing okay.

She got a reply later that night, going like this:

_Hi April!  
Thanks for your concern. I'm better now. I had a little talk with Splinter, and he said that I was responsible for saving the city. He has a point. Besides, I remembered what you said, that I shouldn't let this stop me. So I started working on my newest invention right after we got back to the lair – a laser-guided, missile-launching wooden stick. And no worries, the damages in the lair are only minor._


	12. Something Useful

_This chapter takes place right after "Metalhead" and before "Monkey Brains". :)_

_And thanks to all my readers for their feedback! ^^ *hugs*  
_

* * *

**Chapter 12: Something Useful**

With a growl Raph knocked his broom on the floor.

"Why do we have to do the cleaning, if it was Donnie's stupid laser-stick, that caused all this mess?!" he asked, his voice a mix of anger and frustration. And that never was a good combination.

"It was no laser-stick," Donnie replied. "It was a laser-guided, missile launching stick."

But Raph just glared at him for this correction.

This made Donnie lower his eyes quickly.

"I think I can handle it from here alone," he mumbled. "You can go now."

When Raph heard that, he was about to toss the broom away and leave, but Leo placed a hand on his arm.

"No," he said fiercely. "Master Splinter said we should help Donnie, and this is what we'll do."

Raph let out an annoyed sigh, but lowered his arm nonetheless and continued sweeping up.

"I still don't get it," he muttered. "It was _Donnie's_ fault!"

Donnie behaved as if he hadn't heard, but he couldn't help it. As incredible as it sounded, but Raph _did_ have a point. It was his fault. If he hadn't fired that missile inside the lair, nothing would have happened. Okay, he had _accidentally_ fired it, but still. His brothers had run into the tunnel for cover, but Splinter had stayed by his side. When the missile had launched, he had grabbed Donatello and dragged him away as far as they could have gotten before the missile exploded. And when the missile had hit the ceiling, Splinter had dragged him to the ground.

Donnie looked up to the ceiling where he could still see where the missile had hit. It had quarried out pieces of the blocks of stone that built the ceiling here. It was a good thing they were so thick. But little rocks were covering the floor of the pit now, although luckily none of them had hit the TV.

Unfortunately, this didn't go for the dust. The TV was covered in dust as was the couch, and while it had been easy to remove the rocks, getting rid of the dust was a completely different story. This would take some time.

Splinter had said that they should help Donnie cleaning up the mess before he had left for the dojo. But why his brothers had to help him, was a mystery to Donnie. Maybe it had something to do with learning to work as a team, even if this meant to clean the living room together, Donnie thought, but that was just a wild guess.

"So, Donnie, why don't you invent something useful next time?" Raph asked. "Like something we really _need_. Wouldn't that be a good idea?"

"Come on, Raph, leave Donnie alone," Mikey chimed in. "He invented a lot of useful things."

"You mean, he _repaired_ a lot of useful things, like the microwave and the fridge and the TV," Raph explained. "But when it comes to his own inventions, no, not so much."

"The T-pod was useful," Mikey said.

"What for?" Raph asked.

"Listening to music!" Mikey said.

"And that makes our life easier because…?"

"Because…" – Mikey frowned for a moment – "because I could listen to my music without disturbing you. Now, if that's not useful, I don't know."

Raph just rolled his eyes. "Whatever."

"Wait, what about Metalhead? He was supposed to make fighting easier," Mikey said.

"And we all know how well that turned out," Raph grumbled.

"Can it, Raph!" Leo rebuked his brother. "Donnie has the best intentions. Now give him a little break."

"No, Raph has a point," Donnie said which made his brothers look at him with wide eyes. "Maybe I should concentrate on working on stuff that would make our life easier, something we could use right here and now."

"You mean…" – Mikey's eyes grew even wider – "a cleaning robot?"

"No…"

"But we could need a cleaning robot right here and now."

"Mikey, that's a saying."

"Oh, okay." Mikey lowered his eyes for a moment, but then he looked up at Donnie with a big grin. "How about our own super-powerful vacuum cleaner?"

"M-maybe…"

"The world's most advanced pizza oven?"

"I'm not sure if I…"

"No, wait! How about a hover board? I always wanted a hover board!"

* * *

Later that night Donnie was in his lab. His brothers had long gone to bed, but he knew that there was too much going on his head right now to find some sleep. So he turned on his laptop.

He smiled as it booted. His laptop had been one of the first things he had repaired, one of the little treasures he had found at this one junkyard which had a lot of electrical waste. And he had gotten his PC from there as well. But Raph was right. Those were things he had repaired and improved. He now needed to think of something completely new, something they would really need at the moment. But what could that be?

He logged into his e-mail and saw that April had sent him an e-mail, asking if he was doing okay. He replied right away.

He sighed. It would have been nice to be able to hear her voice, but he couldn't call her now. It would take him at least twenty minutes to get to the next safe telephone booth, and it was already very late. Who knew, she maybe was asleep already.

This was one of the things that made contacting April a little difficult. They only could contact her via e-mail or had to get to one of the safe telephone booths. It was a bit annoying, now that he thought of it.

Suddenly, an idea formed in his head. A communications system! They should definitely have their own communications system! Their own mobile phones to be able to contact each other on missions, and to make it a little more fun, maybe he could even include a music player and some games.

_Now that would be something useful, right, Raph?_

He grinned as he quickly grabbed a piece of paper and wrote down his ideas and made a list of things he would need. He then correlated the list with the things he already had in the lab, but there was so much stuff missing.

This called for another junkyard visit, but he would need his brothers' help to get all this stuff home. So this would have to wait until tomorrow night.

He sighed. He was too excited at the moment, so sleep, again, was no option. So what could he do in the meantime?

His eyes fell on the flowchart he had been working on lately, his masterplan to hang with April. He already had some scenarios done, but maybe he could write some more down before sleep finally took a toll on him.

"Well, let's see," he mumbled, following one of the lines with his finger. "If April says she can't hang out because she has homework, what would be a good counterargument?" He thought about it for a moment. "Oh, yeah, right. I'm good with homework, so I could suggest an informal study session." And with a smile he added this to his flowchart.

"You done, nerd?" Raph asked the next night. They were at Donnie's favorite junkyard, the one with all the electrical waste, and Leo, Raph, and Mikey were watching their brother rummaging the junk with a dreamy look on his face.

_Nerd?_, Donnie thought all of a sudden. Was this something April could interpose when he asked her to hang out, that he was a nerd and she didn't want to hang with nerds? He definitely should think of some counterarguments and add this to his flowchart.

But he immediately snapped back to reality when his fingers touched something that felt like a broken mobile phone, the sixth he had found this night. He held it up and mustered it. Yes, this would do.

"I am now," he replied to Raph as he tossed the broken phone into his bag and slung it over his shoulder.

"Finally!" Raph burst out, and even Mikey and Leo seemed a little relieved as they gathered all the bags Donnie had filled with broken things this night.

When they were on their way home, Raph glanced at Donnie.

"So, what do you need all this stuff for?" he asked, the usual grumpy look on his face, but Donnie knew that he asked out of curiosity, although he would never admit it.

Donnie grinned. "For something useful."


	13. Some Thoughts and Some Feelings

_This chapter deals with "Monkey Brains". _

* * *

**Chapter 13: Some Thoughts and Some Feelings**

He had gotten April's number! Oh, what a beautiful, beautiful day!

_Her number's on the fridge, you dork!_

Not even Raphael's comment could ruin Donatello's spirits. And of course, he _knew_ that April's number was on the fridge. He looked at it every day, the numbers written in April's wonderful handwriting which he loved so much. And then her name!

But the difference was that this time, Donnie had asked her for her number, and she had given it to him without even raising a brow or giving him a suspicious look. This was amazing!

And it was just one of the wonderful things that had happened so far this day.

His (mental) list of highlights of today went like this:

- Finishing his flowchart of the master plan to hang with April

- Using the flowchart and finding out that it was working  
_Take that, Raphael! Wanna see you non-nerdy turtle do that!_

- Going on a mission with April alone

- Getting their new communications system ready and wowing his brothers when he showed them the T-phones

- Getting April's number

Oh, this was great!

Okay, on the downside, there were some things that hadn't gone as planned or had turned out rather badly. Getting beaten up by a vicious mutant monkey was one of them – although April had been so nice and caring when he had been hurt. He had been allowed to lean on her on their way home and she had brought him an ice-pack, letting him rest his head on her lap which had been simply wonderful! Well, good, getting laughed at by his brothers and hearing monkey puns for what felt like hours had been a bit annoying, but still. On the whole it hadn't been a total loss.

And now he had gotten April's number!

* * *

And with that thought he joined his brothers on their mission to find Rockwell.

Later that night he could add two more things to his highlights-list:

- Learning to fight without thinking

- Defeating Falco

But what still surprised him was the fact, when he had managed to kind of switch his brain off.

_By the way, do you really think, you have a chance with April?_

There! It still gave his heart a twinge, when he was reminded of how different he and April were, when the terrible, possible truth hit him with all its force. He was a mutant, she was a human. Maybe they would never be together. Maybe she could never love him back because of what he was.

But that was one thing he had learned since that night when he had first seen her – to block these negative thoughts, lock them away in the back of his head.

And that moment, when he had faced Falco, it had been what had helped him to actually stop thinking. He had remembered all these times he had already done this with the negative thoughts, so why wouldn't he be able to do that with all the other thoughts as well – lock them away, stop thinking?

_I can do this! I just have to fight without thinking. No thinking. No thinking! ... Don't think! Just do!_

And he had done it! The look on Falco's face when he had realized!

Well, you better not underestimated Donatello. Yes, he was the brainiac of the team, but that didn't mean he couldn't keep his marvelous brain in the background sometimes – or even put it into stand-by-mode.

And a smirk appeared on his face when he thought about his victory.

* * *

April had no idea what had gotten into her earlier. She had just gotten one of her feelings again. While the turtles had been debating on where Rockwell could have disappeared to, she had just known the answer without even thinking about it. He had been hiding in that dumpster. Something had told her this. And when she had opened it, she hadn't even been surprised to find Rockwell cowering inside. She had been sure he would be there. She had _known_!

_Sometimes I just get a feeling about things._

It was the truth. It had always been like this. Okay, usually it hadn't been about mutants, just finding something she had lost or knowing what someone would tell her before they had even opened their mouth. She had never questioned that. It was part of being her.

But then Splinter had told her that this was a rare gift – and that he wanted to train her to become a kunoichi, a female ninja. And despite from being an honor, this was just freaking awesome! She would be able to kick some butt if she had to! She wouldn't feel like a fifth wheel any longer when the guys switched into action-mode and all she could do was stand back. No, pretty soon she would be able to join them! Ha!

And then she remembered what else she had said – and mentally slapped herself for that. It couldn't be worse than high school? Splinter offered to train her and all she had been able to do was playing it down by making some stupid comments? _Way to show your sensei respect, April!_ She slightly shook her head. _You gotta work on this, April!_

But she had been too excited to say something intelligent. It would get better – she hoped.

After leaving the dojo she was in the kitchen for a few moments to look if there was anything she could help Mikey with. The youngest turtle was preparing dinner, but since there wasn't anything she could do, she just talked to Mikey for a little while, but then decided to leave the kitchen again.

She had just entered the aisle when Splinter approached her.

"April, if you don't have any school obligations tonight, I would like to start your training tonight," he said.

April nodded eagerly. "Sure! I mean, of course, I mean, I don't have any school obligations, so training is cool! I mean, yes."

What was that about getting better? She mentally shook her head.

But Splinter just smiled at her. "Very well. I'll see you at the dojo in half an hour."

And with that he left again.

* * *

So when she was on her way to the dojo later, she was stopped by Donnie, coming out of his lab. But when he caught sight of her, he leaned on the door frame in what she thought was supposed to look cool.

"Hey, April! You…ah…wanna hang out tonight?"

Tonight? No, she had her first training session tonight.

"Uh, that sounds great, Donnie, but I can't. I'm training with Splinter to be a kunoichi!" When she told him that, she couldn't help, but clench her fists to emphasize her thought.

"Oh." Donnie moved a little to the side and his head was shielded by the wall for a moment. She could hear him mumbling some words, but couldn't understand, and then he was back in his supposed-to-be-cool pose and cleared his throat.

"Well, then," he said with a grin, adding to his supposed-to-be-cool pose by brushing his non-existent hair back and then pointing at her, "maybe we can train together sometime."

She smiled at him, clapping her hands. "Sounds great!"

And then she left. Okay, she hadn't even begun her training yet, but being able to train with Donnie one day, with a real ninja, sounded like something she should never turn down. Besides, knowing Donnie, it would be fun.

She smiled when she entered the dojo. Splinter was already waiting for her.

_Okay, let's turn me into a kunoichi!_


	14. The People in Their Life

_This chapter takes place after "Never Say Xever"._

* * *

**Chapter 14: The People in Their Life**

With a sigh April opened the window of her room and sat down on the window bench, drinking in the air.

She had just come home from school and her aunt wouldn't be home within the next two hours so she had some time left before dinner. Some time to think. And yes, she needed it.

So maybe it hadn't been such a good idea to bring the guys to Murakami's. It had felt like the best idea in the world first when she had found this noodle place and its blind owner, and Mr. Murakami was such a nice man. The noodle place wasn't very popular, but the food was pretty good, so it had seemed like the perfect place to bring the guys to, to make them do something besides hitting people.

But after what had happened afterwards – the fight with the Purple Dragons, Murakami getting kidnapped – April was a bit insecure.

But what was so wrong about wanting her friends to have some sort of a normal life? Well, as normal as life could be for four ninja turtles and their rat sensei.

And the more she thought about it, the more she realized, this wasn't about the guys in the first place. It was more about her. Although she knew that the guys would never ask something from her, that she in no way was in their debt, she couldn't help, but feel a little like she was nonetheless. They had saved her, they had let her into their life, they had taken care of her when her old life had crumbled into pieces. So why shouldn't she try to give them something in return? And more than just a pizza every now and then.

She didn't know much about ninja things. She had just started her training with Splinter, and everything was new to her. So all she could relate to was her normal, human life when she thought of ways to give something back to her friends.

And she knew a few things about them. They all liked to go topside, they loved their little – or big – adventures, and Mikey was so eager to meet other humans. So April had thought of it as a good plan. Mikey would meet another human and they all would go on a little adventure called "having dinner in a restaurant".

If she only had known what this would get Mr. Murakami into! She maybe would have rethought her plan. Well, first, the turtles had saved him from getting beaten up by Purple Dragons which actually was a good thing, but getting kidnapped by Xever to act as bait for the turtles, sure wasn't.

But Murakami had been so thankful. He had even invented a new dish for the turtles – pizza gyoza.

So, bringing the turtles to Murakami's hadn't been such a bad idea after all – if she kept the life-threatening situations aside. But maybe that was the price someone had to pay if they wanted to be friends with the turtles – a price she most certainly was willing to pay.

If she had to face vicious mutants, hostile ninjas, and alien brains in robot bodies to be their friend, she would do it. It was the price for the people in their life – the few people in their life.

She sighed.

She found it kind of awful that the turtles did so much for this city without getting anything in return. They were the only ones who fought the Kraang. And no one even knew about it!

But she knew that it was for their own best. If too many people knew about them, it could get them into danger.

April fiercely shook her head as some images of scientists dissecting her best friends appeared before her mental eye.

No, this would never happen! Not as long as she could do something about it. And what she could do was keeping their secret. And that, she would do.

At that moment her phone rang. She looked at the caller ID and smiled. She had nearly forgotten that she had other friends beside the turtles.

_Normal life, calling April O'Neil_, she thought with a smirk as she picked up.

"Hello, Irma!"

"_Excuse me, is this the number of a certain April O'Neil?"_ came Irma's annoyed voice. "I'm _not sure because I haven't heard from her in __ages__."_

April flinched a little. Yes, now that she thought of it, she had really neglected her friends with all her online researches and meeting the guys.

"I'm sorry about that, Irma, I was…busy," she apologized.

That wasn't even a lie. She had been busy, but she tried to stay vague about her activities.

"_And doing what exactly?"_ Irma asked further.

_Damn it!_ April had known Irma would ask more questions. She always did that. It was Irma, for heaven's sake. Asking questions was one of her more charming character traits.

"Well, this and that," April replied. "But hey, I'm having some problems with the essay for biology. Think you could help me a little?"

That was a lie. She had written that essay yesterday evening at the lair. Donnie had helped her – after he had persuaded her to taste pizza gyoza. Yes, she had had her doubt first, but hey, he had been right. Pizza gyoza were amazing!

"_Well, I'm already done with that,"_ Irma said, and what followed then was one of her trademark monologues.

April smiled. Now that had worked, hadn't it?

* * *

When Irma had finally decided she had given April enough input and should now give her time to work on her essay half an hour later, April couldn't help, but smile as she tucked her phone away again.

She really had to think of some believable excuses or else Irma would get even more suspicious.

April closed her eyes for a moment, taking another deep breath. Yes, she felt a little bad about having to lie to her friends about her other friends. But she knew she had to. Anything else could put the guys in danger, and that was the last thing she wanted.

Well, it was what the people in the turtles' life had to do – keep their existence a secret. For their own sake.


	15. The Promise

_This chapter takes place after "The Gauntlet"._

* * *

**Chapter 15: The Promise**

_I love you too, Daddy!_

Her words were still ringing in his ears, sounding so real that he thought she must be standing right next to him. He knew she wasn't. He had checked twice. But after nearly being killed by your sensei's mortal enemy, you better checked twice if someone was there, close to you. His brain could be playing tricks on him which actually wouldn't be a surprise after what had happened. His battered body was hurting, clouding his senses, so he better looked one time too often than one too less. Better safe than sorry.

Not that April would do him any harm. She was far from that. But she could startle him, and in his momentary physical and mental state, he wasn't sure if he wouldn't hit her out of reflex. And that was something he really didn't want to happen.

April was hurting enough already. Okay, not physically, but he knew from experience that mental wounds could hurt just as much.

And after meeting Pete, the mutant pigeon, receiving a message from her father, and then being so close to getting him back, only to have him been captured by the Kraang again sure must hurt a lot.

_We'll get him back, April. I promise._

Yes, he had promised her to get her father back, back on this rooftop when she had hugged him because she had needed someone to hold on, to cling to in her desperation. The hurt look in her eyes, every fiber of her face showing in how much pain she was in that moment, he would never forget.

And this promise was what had kept him up tonight. His brothers went to bed hours ago and were now sleeping away their pain, just like they had done yesterday night after their encounter with the Shredder, just like Donnie had done yesterday. But tonight, sleep just hadn't come Donnie's way. Maybe he wasn't exhausted enough like he had been yesterday. He had been lying in bed for an hour or so himself, trying to find a position that would _not_ hurt, but failed. So he had just lain there without moving for another thirty minutes – he knew because he had been counting the seconds, hoping that it would have the same effect as counting sheep –, but still, sleep had no understanding.

So he had gotten up again, thinking that working on something would make him exhausted enough to finally fall asleep. And given his state of mind, it was no wonder that he was pottering around with the phone Pete had given April and not working on his latest invention, an all-terrain patrol buggy with four detachable sidecars.

He wasn't even sure what he was trying to find on this phone. The Kraang had most probably moved Mr. O'Neil to another facility after Donnie and his brothers had nearly rescued him yesterday. So there was no point in looking at its GPS-locks – although he looked at them nonetheless – and it sure was no Kraang-device, just a normal phone. Pete seemed to have snatched it from a delivery guy, given its GPS-locks. This phone had been all over the city, and having been carried around by a flying mutant pigeon sure had contributed to that.

But there needed to be something on this phone, something that could tell him where Mr. O'Neil was right now, something that would make stop April hurting, something that would make him keep his promise.

He was working for hours looking at each and every file that had been saved on this phone – what did you know? From the pictures, its former owner really seemed to be a pizza delivery guy– but without getting any closer to Mr. O'Neil's current whereabouts.

He then started picking apart the phone, examining each and every of its parts, even the tiniest screw, carefully, and pretty soon, all that was left of the phone was a pile of electronic and plastic parts on the table top, looking like some weird 3D-puzzle that was waiting to be put together again.

Donnie sighed, burying his face in his hands. Okay, he had known from the beginning that it had been a thin chance to find something about Mr. O'Neil's whereabouts on this phone. Maybe he had even known that it had been a lost cause right from the start. But he had had to try nonetheless. He'd do anything to stop April's pain.

Now he was sitting there, thinking about April and what he could do to help her, and actually, he was just as close to finding Mr. O'Neil as he had been hours ago. Or as far away, for that matter.

And he wasn't any more tired than he had been hours ago, meaning that even if he got back to bed now, sleep would still not coming his way, and he sure couldn't bear any more sleeplessly tossing and turning in bed.

That was it! He needed to do something, no matter what!

And with that he got up grabbed his bō and left.

* * *

This was the stupidest thing he had ever done, heading right back to that Kraang facility where they had broken in yesterday. His whole body was still hurting like crazy and it took him double the time to get there because he had to avoid any riskier jumps from roof to roof. And he knew that he was in no condition to fight. But he wasn't here to fight, he was here to check.

He only needed to know if the Kraang were still there, because if they were, maybe Mr. O'Neil was, too. Maybe they hadn't had the chance to move him yet. He just needed to have a quick look. And if the Kraang were there, he could get his brothers and once again try to get Mr. O'Neil out of there.

He had just arrived at a nearby rooftop, peering over to the facility's roof. No guards there. This could mean two things. Either the Kraang hadn't tightened security after last night's attack, or they were gone.

Donnie hoped for the first, mentally crossing his fingers that the Kraang really were that dumb as he made his way to the facility's rooftop.

Or it could be a trap.

He realized that too late, at the exact moment when he was tackled and someone pinned him to the ground.

He tried his best to move, but his limbs were hurting so much and his opponent was so strong that he knew immediately that it was of no use.

_Okay, this is it_, he thought and squeezed his eyes shut, awaiting the inevitable.

"What are you doing here, Donatello?"

That voice! Donnie's eyes snapped open in surprise.

"Sensei?"

"In person," was the reply and the weight that had been pinning him down was gone as Splinter got up. He held out a hand, and Donnie grasped it, allowing his sensei to help him up.

Once he was standing again, Splinter looked him over.

"So?" he asked.

"I-I needed to check something," Donnie replied.

"Donatello, you are in no condition to fight at the moment.

"I wasn't here to fight!" he replied quickly.

"And still, you could have been involved in one."

Donnie lowered his eyes. "I know." He sighed. "I just wanted to know if Mr. O'Neil is still here."

"And? Is he?"

"I didn't have a chance to check yet."

"Then do so now."

Donnie hesitated a little, not sure if that meant that Splinter would help him getting Mr. O'Neil out if he was still here, but the moment he had walked over to the "entry" they had used yesterday, the moment he had looked down inside the facility, he knew why his sensei had allowed him to do so. The aisle was dark, abandoned. This could only mean one thing – the Kraang were gone. And Mr. O'Neil with them.

Splinter had known all along.

Donnie swallowed hard, fighting back the tears.

Splinter walked over to him, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder.

"I am sorry, my son."

"How did you know, sensei?"

"I couldn't find any sleep tonight, just like you, and when I saw you leaving the lair I decided to follow you. And when we were close to this building and I was sure that you were headed here, I outran you, checking this place. And when I found it abandoned, I decided to teach you a little lesson. You know that this was stupid, don't you, Donatello?"

Donnie nodded, still looking down to the dark aisle. "What's my punishment, sensei?"

"I think you've already been punished enough, my son," Splinter replied, giving Donnie's shoulder a little squeeze. "Now let's head back home."

Donnie just nodded, but when they were marching back to the roof edge together, he spoke up again.

"I made a promise sensei," he said. "That we will get her father back."

"And I am making a promise now, Donatello," Splinter said. "You WILL get her father back."

Donnie looked up to his sensei who emphasized his thoughts with a warm smile, and he replied with a small smile himself.

And then they vanished into the night.

* * *

Once Donnie was back in his room and Splinter had checked that he had finally fallen asleep, the ninja master knelt down at the tree in the dojo with a sigh.

His sons sure had a tendency to get into trouble. And not only that. They had a tendency to overdo it, to overestimate themselves. Their overconfidence had nearly gotten them killed yesterday, and still, Donatello had rushed off to find April's father.

Splinter squeezed his eyes shut as images of his battered and beaten sons showed up before his mind's eye. He did his best to fight those images of their dead bodies off, but then another thought took over.

They weren't ready.

They were not even close to being ready to face the Shredder, and yet his nemesis was searching the city for them – and him.

And when Splinter opened his eyes again, he knew what he needed to do.

He had to make them ready, at any cost.


	16. Family

_This chapter takes place before/during "Panic in the Sewers"._

* * *

**Chapter 16: Family**

_Noooooooo!_

April awoke with a start. She had seen him again, her father. He had been so close! So close! Just a few more feet and they would have been reunited. But no, he was gone again, led off by the Kraang to a fate unknown to her – and with no sigh when they would see each other again. _If_ they would see it each other again.

April shook her head forcefully. No! This was not the time to think about what the Kraang could do her father. He was of use for the Kraang. He was a scientist, their psychology expert on human behavior. They needed him to make their weapons more frightening. Without him, their invasion plans would have been ruined. So they Kraang wouldn't dare to kill him. They simply _couldn't_ kill him.

At least, that was what April tried to tell herself, each and every night when she awoke from her nightmares. Her father was still alive. He had to be!

She pressed her fingers against her temples, forcing the negative thoughts into the back of her head. She needed her brain for something more important. She had had her hours of being sad, of mourning, of being desperate.

Now it was time to do something. And fast!

Her friends were in danger. And she would do anything to keep them safe. Shredder had shown up, had nearly killed the four brothers, and he would stop at nothing now to see them dead. He was up to something, they all knew. The brothers did, April did, and Splinter, too.

Splinter… From what April could tell, he was having a hard time knowing that his mortal enemy was after his sons. And he had his own way of dealing with it.

From what she knew from Donnie and his desperate text messages from yesterday, Splinter had increased their training hours to nearly twenty-four hours a day to get them ready to face Shredder.

She wasn't sure what sensei was thinking here. Driving his sons to the ground wouldn't make them any more ready to be able to face Shredder, but well, he was the ninja master, she was the kunoichi in training. She didn't have the right to doubt his decisions. But she could still wonder. And that, she did.

And there was this slight feeling that it wasn't the ninja master acting here, but the father. It reminded her a bit of when she had once tried to make breakfast when she was four and had nearly set the kitchen on fire. The kitchen was off limits for a very long time after that, because her father had been too afraid, this could happen again. And he had only allowed her to make something to eat when he was around – well, until he thought she was ready. And until then he had practically locked her out of the kitchen.

And maybe it was the same here. Not only did Splinter train his sons to become better fighters, no, he kept them away from Shredder, too.

Splinter and her father, they seemed to be quite overprotective when it came to their children.

_Her father…_

A small smile appeared on April's face before the sad realization of her father being gone wiped the smile away from her face and made her frown again. But then she shook her head forcefully once more.

There was no time for that!

And with that she pushed her blankets away, knowing that sleep wouldn't come her way anytime soon.

So she got up and walked over to her desk, checking the content of her messenger bag for tomorrow's mission. Everything was there – the hoodie jacket, the bugging device, and she had downloaded the app she needed on her phone yesterday. So she was good to go.

Thanks to Donnie's hacking skills – no police file was safe from him as long as it was somewhere on a computer – they knew where the Purple Dragons' hideout was. And she would spy on them tomorrow.

But she needed to get something first. From what she had learned during the incident with Pete, the mutant pigeon, bait always worked. And she needed bait for tomorrow's mission. And what she had in mind needed to be fresh from the oven. She chuckled a bit when she thought of the little joke she had allowed herself. She would use a pizza as bait – the Turtles' favorite food.

And if that wasn't meant to work, she had no idea what else would.

* * *

They were all gathered in the living room, after the brothers had tried to find out what Shredder was up to, sneaking into that meeting, getting some more intel – and had failed when they had run into former human, now mutant dog Chris Bradford, now being named "Dogpound" by Mikey.

"What? 'Cause he's a dog and he pounded us into the…"

"We get it!" Leo stopped him going into more detail. They knew what Dogpound had done to them, how they hadn't been a match to him. Leo sighed. "I don't see how we're gonna get close to that meeting now."

Donnie sighed. "Haaa, maybe we just need to find a new place to hide." He showed his laptop to the others where he had opened a website about Florida. "I hear the sewers in Florida are nice this time of the year."

_What?_ April couldn't believe what she had just heard. They wanted to leave? They wanted to give up? And even worse they wanted to leave her? No, she couldn't take it if she was left behind again. Her father had been kidnapped, and there was no way she could deal with another loss. Not now. Not when the people who were discussing to leave her were so close to her. They were her friends! She couldn't let them do this. They just couldn't leave her. She needed them!

Was she being selfish? Maybe. But she simply couldn't let them give up that easily; let them throw in the towel, not after what they had all been going through together.

Yes, she needed them, and she hoped that they needed her as well. And now was another chance to give them back for all the things they had done for her.

"No!" she jumped forward, sitting down on the couch between Donnie and Leo, and shut Donnie's laptop. "I'm not letting you guys give up." She got up again, taking a confident stand in front of them. "I will spy on the meeting."

"No way!"

"Na-ah!"

"You can't!"

"Forget it!"

"Absolutely not!" Splinter agreed with his sons.

April knitted her brows. She had banked on rejection, so she had to make her point clearer, had to point out the obvious, had to make them understand how much she needed to this, how much she wanted to do this.

She took a quick breath. "I can do this!" She turned to Splinter. "You've been training me to be a kunoichi!"

"For a few weeks!" Splinter pointed out.

Yes, she knew, but still, that was better than nothing. And it had to be enough.

"What choice do we have?" she continued. "Shredder's gonna attack your home and we need to find out how. And I'm the only one who can do it."

When the four brothers turned to look at each other, she knew that they had understood. She turned to Splinter who crossed his arms over his chest, moving his head to the side and closing his eyes, so he didn't have to face her, so he could think.

For a moment, April was afraid. They still could say no, no matter how good her points were. They could say no although they knew she was right.

She bit her lip, thinking of speaking up again, emphasizing her thought. But in that moment, Splinter lifted his head again, looked at her for a split-second before he turned his eyes to Leo.

April turned to face Leo was well. He nodded. They had come to a silent agreement.

Leo got to his feet, looking into her eyes.

"Okay, April," he said earnestly. "But you gotta promise me that you stay out of danger as best as you can. Understood?"

April nodded with a smile. "Understood."

* * *

Okay, she had understood, but that didn't mean she had to stick to it. Besides, "as best as she could" was a loose concept. But she was pretty sure that Leo would consider sneaking into Shredder's lair was too close to danger, but she didn't care. That was all she could do now, improvise.

She mentally thanked Splinter for this few weeks of training or else she wouldn't have been able to make this jump to the rooftop and sneak inside. But she was there now; she was inside Shredder's lair. She was going to spy on that meeting. And with that she pulled out her phone and held it so that the others could hear how Shredder explained his plan to his henchmen.

She was still totally thrilled by what she had achieved when she was climbing down the fire escape again, telling the guys that she was going to hitch a ride, trying to find out where Bradford and the others would go.

But it looked like she had pushed her luck a little too much. Bradford had heard her and now he came for her. And there wasn't much she could do when his big hands grabbed her.

Yes, she maybe had saved her friends, or had at least helped them, but who would have known that now she would need some saving herself?

But when she could count on something, then it was that her friends would never let her down. When they had stopped the van she was in, she could pretty soon here noises from a fight. Looked like the Foot ninja were getting a proper beat down. Served them right.

Fong simply jumped up from the driver's seat and out of the car, watching the fight for a few moments, before he decided that maybe he should interfere.

Too bad he was passing the van on April's side, and too bad for him that April had decided that it was time for her to interfere as well. She quickly kicked the door open, and Fong ran right into it.

She jumped out of the car, looking at Raph and Donnie self-confidently.

"Nice shot!" Donnie called out.

"Nice wheels!" April gave back, referring to these amazing go-carts they had been driving.

"Oh, well, I built them, you know." Donnie took a stance in front of her, crossing his arms over his plastron, laughing a little, and sticking his nose up a little.

April smiled at him. Yes, sometimes he loved to brag. And who could blame him? He was doing a great job.

It was the moment when the go-cart – its correct name was "Patrol Buggy", Donnie informed her later – fell to pieces noisily.

Donnie's bragging stance was gone within seconds as he first turned to the Patrol Buggy, and then back to her, avoiding her eyes as he placed a hand on his head.

"They're not ready yet," he explained.

April choked a chuckle at that. When Raph got behind her and she could feel his fingers fumbling with her bonds, she shifted a little so he could get them off more easily.

When he was done she thanked him with a smile, but it wouldn't be Raph if he hadn't just shrugged it off. And this behavior made her smile a little more. Yes, this was Raph, through and through.

* * *

Back at the fire escape of her aunt's apartment, she said good-bye to her friends.

She was so glad that they were safe now, that they wouldn't have to leave the city, that she wouldn't lose them.

She realized that Leo let himself fall back while the others were already climbing up to the roof.

He hesitated a bit, but then turned around.

"April," he addressed her when his brothers were out of earshot. "I guess you know that what you've done was stupid. You could have gotten yourself killed!"

"But it worked, Leo!" she gave back stubbornly. "And I had to do something!"

Leo sighed. "I know, April. And I have to admit, it was kind of cool. But for the future, no more solo actions, okay? I am the leader of this team, I am responsible for the safety of my team members. So next time, wait for my approval, okay?"

April nodded. "Okay." But deep down inside her, she knew that if something similar to today's events would happen again, she would take off on her own without even thinking about it. And Leo knew it, too. She was sure about that. Otherwise he wouldn't emphasize his responsibility as much.

But then the serious look on her face turned into a smirk.

"Soooooo, are you really seeing me as a member of your team?" she asked.

Leo's eyes widened. "Well…uhm…m-maybe…I mean, yes…I mean you know I do, don't you?"

"I do now," April gave back with a smile. "Thanks, Leo. This means a lot to me."

Leo returned her smile. "You're welcome, April."

But then they heard Raph's angry voice. "Leo, you're taking roots down there or what?"

"Coming!" Leo yelled back, and then turned back to April.

"Good night, April!"

"Good night, Leo!"

And without any noise he had disappeared into the night.

When April closed the window, she was still smiling.

She was a member of their team, not only their friend! She was one of them now!

After her father had been kidnapped, she always had felt, there was no place she fit in any longer. The lair, the Turtles, Splinter, they had been close to this place, but she had only been a friend, a bystander most of the times. She had always known she was important to them as they were important to her, but what Leo had just said meant that she now was part of their world. They weren't just friends. They were family.

And sighing happily, she let herself slump down on her bed.


	17. Not Nothing

_This chapter deals with "Mousers Attack!"_

* * *

**Chapter 17: Not Nothing**

"Give me your money!" the man had said. "Give me your phone!" he had said, and April hadn't been able to do anything else, but obey.

And now she felt miserable about it. She was a kunoichi, okay, a kunoichi in training, but she had thought that she could at least do something to protect herself. Well, she wasn't totally defenseless, that was for sure. But she knew that she wouldn't stand a chance against three grown men, so she had just done as they had wished and handed over her money and phone.

She couldn't help, but feel a little as if that last weeks of training had been useless. She knew they weren't, not at all. A few weeks ago, she most probably would have gotten herself into even more trouble than being mugged. She would have refused to give them her money and phone, she would have tried to get away, she would have tried to fight them, she would have kicked and scratched and bitten – and maybe even gotten herself killed.

So, yes, she had learned something – when it was better to stand back. That was when she wouldn't stand a chance. And she knew pretty well now what she was capable of. And fighting three men still was beyond her reach. At least now. Maybe, one day – a day for which she hoped to come sooner than later – she would be able to do that, but not now. No, not now.

But she still felt miserable, especially after her four mutant friends had taken off to get her phone back. She had a bad feeling about this. They had nearly gotten themselves killed because of their overconfidence back when they had faced the Shredder, and still, they rushed off, hurled themselves into a fight they didn't know anything about beforehand to get her phone back. All of this because it were _just_ the Purple Dragons. Hadn't they learned anything?

She had tried to tell them by saying that a phone wasn't worth this, Splinter had tried to tell them, too, but they hadn't been listening.

She scolded herself that she hadn't even tried to hide her feelings when she had arrived here. She had felt terrible back then and all she had wanted to do was talk to someone about it, to get some comfort. Who would have known it would make her friends simply run out of the lair to get her phone back?

Well, _she_ should have known. She knew them, she knew their characters. She should have known that they would do this for her because she was their friend, no, she was family. But still, she hadn't expected this. She had thought they would just calm her down, that they would try to make her feel better. She had definitely not thought that they would try to get her phone back. She had thought that they would made her sit down on the couch, make her a calming cup of tea, maybe get some delicious pizza gyoza, and give her some comfort. Normal friends would have done this. She simply had forgotten that her four green friends were beyond normal.

She heaved a sigh. Even an hour of training with Splinter hadn't helped her feel any better. Yes, it had stopped her negative thoughts for a little while, but now, they were all back, roaming around in her head.

"Why are you so sad, April?" a voice asked, and April jumped a little, but not enough to fall of the couch she was sitting on.

She lifted her head to look at Splinter who was eyeing her with concern.

"It's nothing," April replied quickly.

He pointed at the couch. "May I?"

April nodded. "Of course!"

Splinter sat down next to her.

"April, you are truly sad," he said then. "So I'd say, it is not nothing. Do you mind telling me what is going on?"

April exhaled. "I'm just…worried," she confessed. "I mean the guys have just nearly gotten themselves killed when they faced the Shredder because they were overconfident, and still, they take off without really thinking about it to get my phone back. It just doesn't seem right."

Splinter closed his eyes for a moment, and then chuckled softly.

"I have to admit, April, you do have a point," he said. "I thought myself that the incident with the Shredder would have my sons thinking. But they are young and they have a lot to learn still. I hope the incident with the Shredder has at least helped them to estimate their skills better. They may still pick fights they had better not picked in the first place, but I hope they at least know what they can handle and what not."

April nodded. "I hope you're right."

"Me too."

They sat in silence for a few moments.

"But there is more to it, isn't it?" Splinter spoke up again.

April sighed. "Yes," she admitted. "I'm afraid they are only doing this because I'm their friend. Something could happen to them and it would be my fault."

"April," Splinter addressed her. "My sons are free to choose their own fights. And if they are doing this for you, then they have chosen to do so. They know the risks."

April gave a slight nod.

"All we can do now is hope that they come back home safely," Splinter said. "And that they learn something about choosing their fights more wisely."

* * *

After her talk with Splinter, April had relaxed a little. Splinter didn't seem that worried, and he knew their abilities better than she did. So she wasn't that worried any longer, just a little worried.

As for the lesson Splinter had hoped they would learn, they seemed to have understood, at least a little. April heard Donnie confessing that by talking about the irony in what had happened to them that night. And Leo chimed in by saying that they had learned their lesson, and that they had achieved their goal and had gotten April's phone back.

"You did?" she called out, entering the lair. She had just come back from dinner with her aunt. "Sweet!"

Well, that was good news. They had gotten back home in one piece, they had learned their lesson, and they had gotten her phone back.

But when Donnie showed her her phone and it fell into pieces in his hand, she couldn't help, but be a little disappointed.

"Uhhh, the important thing is it didn't end up in the wrong hands," Leo tried to save the situation.

"Gee, thanks, guuuuys," she said sarcastically.

"Ah, don't worry, April!" Donnie said, showing her one of his T-phones. "You can have one of my custom-built T-phones."

A T-phone? Wow, this was awesome! She had always wanted to have one of those.

She took it from his hands. "Oh, cool!"

Then Mikey showed up out of nowhere behind her and Leo, placing his hands on their shoulders.

"Just don't say, 'T-phone, self-destruct!'", he explained, and suddenly there was a terrible sound and some sparks, and the T-phone in April's hands vibrated a little, turning all dark.

"Or else that happens," Mikey clarified and disappeared again.

April just looked at the smoking T-phone in her hands. Okay, she had so not seen that one coming.


	18. Energy Source

_This chapter takes place right after "It Came from the Depths". _

* * *

**Chapter 18: Energy Source**

They were standing there, in the open door of the subway cart, trying to cope with what had just happened, the high-speed ride through the tunnels.

This had been one heck of a ride! Seriously!

Donnie stared at the sight before him, the sewage plant. And this meant that his calculations had been right.

He heard Mikey saying something about the plant being beautiful, but of course, only Mikey who could see the beauty in something like this.

For Donnie, it was far from beautiful.

He on the other hand could get all excited over a broken hard drive, something Mikey would call nice, if anything.

Leo blew his cheeks up. "Sooooooo," he drawled after he had exhaled. "What do we do now?"

"Uhm, get back to the lair?" Raph suggested.

"I know that, Raph!" Leo replied. "But how? Do we use this subway cart again or do we go by foot? That's what I meant!"

"Well, then why didn't you say so?" Raph asked.

Leo just shot him an angry glance.

"We can't leave the subway cart here," Donnie chimed in. "It will draw too much attention which means we have to bring it back underground."

"Can we use the power cell again?" Leo asked.

Donnie shifted a bit uneasily. "I could give it a try, but considering our last ride, I'd say we better push the subway cart back underground."

He earned annoyed growls from Leo and Raph in return. Mikey, however, was still staring at the plant with his eyes wide as saucers.

"Sorry." Donnie shrugged. "But if we try it again with the power cell, we might end up in New Jersey this time."

"Okay," Leo sighed and got outside.

"Come on, shellbrain! This means you too!" Raph called out, giving Mikey a push which made him stumble out of the cart with a yelp, and Raph jumped out of the cart right after him.

Donnie just took another deep breath until he followed suit.

* * *

They had pushed Leatherhead's subway cart as far back into the tunnels as possible, leaving it somewhere on abandoned rails not even that far away from the lair.

Donnie had brought the power cell back to the lair, carrying it carefully all the way.

The energy of this cell was radiating inside, and Donnie's thoughts were simply turning over when he thought of what secrets this cell would hold, what he could do with it.

He could feel a shiver of anticipation making his skin tingle.

Alien technology, a crystal with an amazing amount of energy, something that could power nearly anything! Oh, this was so exciting!

He was sitting in his lab, the power cell resting on the desk before him, and he was just staring at it dreamily, and he must have been grinning like an idiot, because when Mikey approached him, he chuckled.

"Dude, did April get some competition?" Mikey asked teasingly. "You're staring at this thing as if you want to ask it out on a date."

"Haha," Donnie replied tonelessly, looking back at Mikey with a twisted mouth. "Very funny."

"Indeed!" Mikey called out. "You look like you want to kiss it any moment!"

To emphasize his thought, Mikey started making kissing noises.

Donnie just rolled his eyes.

"I get it, Mikey!" he said. "Now, what do you want?"

Mikey stopped with the kissing noises and looked at Donnie, blinking a few times, before his brain seemed to kick back in again.

"Oh, yeah, right," he said then. "Raph, Leo, and I are going to look for Leatherhead. We want to make sure that he is okay, after all he did, you know."

Mikey lowered his eyes, and Donnie knew exactly that his brother was thinking about what could have happened to his new friend.

"No worries, Mikey, I'm sure he's okay," he said. "I mean his a giant alligator mutant with razor-sharp teeth. And you know how big the bite force of an alligator is." He thought about that for a moment. "Okay, maybe you don't," he added. "But I can assure you, it is a _lot_. He can crush Kraang droids with that jaws of his just like that, believe me."

Mikey lifted his head and smiled at. "Thanks, Donnie."

"You're welcome."

"Sooooooo, do you wanna come?" Mikey asked then.

Donnie hesitated. He could still feel his face hurt where Leatherhead had grabbed him. Two times.

Why his face, seriously? What was _wrong_ with his face?

"No, thanks," he replied. "I have a bunch of work to do."

"Ooooooooohhhhh, I can see that!" Mikey gave back, grinning from ear to ear and nodding his head into the direction of the power cell. He made one more kissing noise, than waved at his brother and left.

Donnie just slapped his hand on his forehead, shaking his head slowly. But he couldn't help, but give a little chuckle.

* * *

He had been staring at the power cell again for who knew how long when suddenly April peeked over his shoulder.

"Heh, is that the power cell, Leo was talking about?" she asked.

Donnie cried out in surprise and fell off his chair.

_Way to go for a ninja, Donnie, really, getting that lost in your thoughts!_

But April was a kunoichi in training, so maybe she only had been able to sneak up on him because of her training.

Yes, Donnie gave a mental nod as he picked himself up again. He was totally going to see it that way.

"H-hey, Apri!" he greeted her with an insecure laugh. "H-how are you doing?"

"I'm doing fine," April gave back with a smile. "Arrived here fifteen minutes ago and ran into your brothers when they left. Leo gave me a quick report on what happened to you guys today." Suddenly her smile turned into a concerned look. "Are you okay, Donnie? Raph said Leatherhead grabbed you by the face several times. He didn't hurt you, did he?"

And with that she moved a hand to his cheek and touched it gently. "Is that a scratch there?"

Donnie's hands quickly grabbed the back of his chair, desperately searching for something to hold on because it felt like his knees would give in.

April seemed to realize because she took her hand away with a frown. "You _are_ okay, right?"

All Donnie could manage was staring back at her wide-eyed and nodding.

"Great," April replied and her smile was back again, warmer and happier this time.

"So what about this thing?" she asked and tapped the power cell gently with her index finger.

And just like that all the awkwardness faded from Donnie and he was back to his scientific self.

"Oh, it is a massive source of energy, it could power nearly anything," he explained. "With the right components, I mean."

"And you already know what to power with it, right?"

"Well, I have one or two things in mind," Donnie replied.

"One or two?" April asked, watching him with a smirk on her face.

"Okay, maybe fifteen," he admitted.

April chuckled. "Yeah, I thought so."

Donnie then started to tell her a few details about the projects he had in mind, and April was listening closely.

* * *

By the time he had reached project number seven, he could hear his brothers enter the lair.

"We're back!" Mikey called out. "And we brought pizza!"

April and Donnie looked at each other and then in some sort of silent agreement got up and left the lab.

They sat down on the couch where the others were waiting already.

"How's Leatherhead?" April asked as she grabbed a slice of pizza."

"Leahterhead's fine," Mikey replied. "Okay, he went all angry again because Raph kept mentioning the you-know-who, but since Donnie wasn't there to grab him by the face, we could calm him pretty easily.

"Heh, I thought he was done with going all crazy over the Kraang," Raph tried to defend himself. "I mean, did you see that place? It was a battlefield!"

"I think _junkyard_ is more like it," Leo chimed in.

"Exactly!" Raph replied. "And I thought after smashing so many Kraang he was too exhausted to fight anyway." He shrugged. "My mistake."

"Since his place is a Kraang-junkyard now, Leather is going to move back to the place where he had hidden the power cell, just without the boogie traps," Leo explained. "And he said we can always come to him when we need his help."

"That's nice," April said.

_Yeah, nice_, Donnie thought, but he wasn't thinking about Leatherhead, he was looking at April when he thought that.

Suddenly he felt all warm and secure and happy. He forgot about how Leatherhead had grabbed him by the face, how the skin on his face was still hurting from that. It didn't matter.

All that mattered now was the small area of cheek April had touched this evening.

Was it just him or did his skin prickle there? Prickle in a warm and secure and happy way, of course.

It was a wonderful feeling, he realized as he munched on his pizza, shyly lifting one hand and touching his cheek carefully. The prickle didn't go away, he could still feel it. He could still feel how her fingers had touched his skin. And he really, really liked it.


	19. Naming Skills

_This chapter deals with "I, Monster". And at the end, it gives a little explanation what might have happened to Donnie's special ringtone for April in "Karai's Vendetta". ;)_

* * *

**Chapter 19: Naming Skills**

"The bangs were a little long anyway," April said as she caught the little of hair Splinter had cut off with his sword.

And she couldn't help it, but she was trembling a little. If Splinter hadn't stopped his attack all of a sudden because of whatever reason, she would be…she would be…

She couldn't finish this thought, but instead buried her face in her hands, letting some tears run down her cheeks, until the trembling got a little easier to bear.

She then removed her hands from her face, shaking her head fiercely.

There were more important things to do right now. And with that she grabbed her T-phone, dialing Donnie's number.

"_Uhm, April, now is not really the best time_," Donnie said when he answered the phone.

"Donnie, it's Splinter!" she called out, not really caring about if it was the best time or not. She needed to tell them! "He's gone!"

"_What do you mean, 'gone'? Gone where?"_

She could hear a voice in the background and then the line was dead.

She blinked at her T-phone disbelievingly.

_Oh my gosh, take care, guys…_

* * *

April jumped from her seat on the couch when they all entered the dojo, letting out the breath she had been holding in a huff, all the tension that had been holding her in its grip ever since the call with Donnie had ended abruptly, faded and a warm smile appeared on her face when she saw that they all were okay. And Splinter was with them! They had gotten him back, and he seemed fine again.

She had been so worried! Last time she had seen Splinter he had been someone else, a puppet that had only obeyed the Rat King. And she had been so scared. She had tried to reach for what was left of the Splinter she knew inside of him by telling him that it was her he was attacking, but it hadn't worked. She had only managed to dodge his first attacks, knowing somehow that he hadn't really meant to attack her. He had just tried to find her weak spots. And when he had attacked once more and she had known that this time, it had been for real, she had simply been frozen to the spot.

But without Splinter's training, she wouldn't even have been able to survive his first attacks, so she was thankful for that.

Splinter answered her smile with a warm smile of his own, but it quickly turned into a frown.

"Are you alright, April?" he asked as he marched over to her. Hesitantly, he placed a hand on her shoulder, and April knew that he somehow must remember what had happened in the dojo earlier.

"Yes, sensei," she replied, still smiling at him. "I'm unharmed."

Splinter let out a deep breath and gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze. "I'm glad to hear that."

He removed his hand from her shoulder and looked over to his sons.

"Please see April home, my sons," he told them. "I need to meditate."

"Hai sensei," they answered with one voice and respectful bows.

Splinter turned back to her. "Good night, April."

"Good night, sensei," she replied and bowed just like her four friends had done a moment ago.

Splinter just tilted his head a little with a smile and left for the dojo.

* * *

On their way to her aunt's apartment, April could literally feel the tension between the brothers. They were all relieved that it had gone well, that they had been able to bring back their sensei, but she knew them, and she knew that they were all going over the what-ifs.

Well, except for Mikey who was humming some random melody, but this was just his way of dealing with such situations.

And April thought, too, that it was enough with the brooding for one night.

"So how did it go?" she asked into Mikey's direction, remembering something from earlier today. "Did you find a better villain name for Falco?"

"Sheesh, I could have thought of a million better names!" Mikey replied. "Like Ratzilla, The Verminator, Lord Ratington, Count Ratula."

His brothers just groaned in unison.

"But you know, April," Mikey continued as if he hadn't noticed. "It looked like 'Rat King' had become established already. But don't you worry!" He straightened himself into a self-conscious pose with his hands placed on his hips. "I'm naming the next one!"

April choked a giggle. "Well, that's good to know. And you think you really are prepared for all the possibilities there are?"

"Of course I am!" Mikey replied. "I always have a few names in the back of my head that might work."

"I guess that's pretty much all that's there in the back of his head," Raph mumbled. "Names."

Mikey didn't seem to have noticed or simply ignored that comment and went on, "Like a giant insect mutant could be called Buzzilla or…Ouch!"

Mikey rubbed the back of his head where Raph had hit him.

"We've had enough of this today," Raph simply said with a shrug.

"Oh, look who's jealous of my great naming skills!" Mikey called out, but when Raph lifted his hand once more, Mikey quickly ran over to April with a yelp and hid behind her.

"Oh, and look who's jealous of my great hitting skills!" Raph said with a smirk as he lowered his hand again.

Mikey just stuck his tongue out at him, but yelped once more and made himself smaller behind April when Raph lifted his hand again.

Raph replied with another smirk and joined Leo and Donnie who had watched this grinning.

And then they continued their path.

"Oh, by the way, April," Mikey said when he walked next to her, "Did you know, Donnie has a special ringtone for you?"

Donnie stopped in his track and Raph bumped into him.

"Heh, a little warning, genius!" Raph said as he pushed past him.

"A special ringtone?" April asked, looking from Mikey to Donnie.

Donnie turned to her with a sheepish grin on his face. "No, no, I do not," he said laughing insecurely.

"But we all heard it, Donnie. Twice!" Mikey insisted.

"I said I don't have a special ringtone for April!" Donnie told him angrily.

"Soooooo, if April called you right now, it wouldn't be this cheesy birds' twittering?" Mikey asked.

"No, it won't!" Donnie replied, taking out his T-phone and pushing a few buttons. "April, call me, please."

"Uhm, okay," April said and reached for her T-phone, dialing Donnie's number, and when Donnie's phone rang, it was the usual ringtone they all had.

"Ha!" Donnie made. "I told you!"

"You just changed that back!" Mikey retorted with a twisted mouth.

Donnie just ignored him and moved along.

"I swear, April, he had a special ringtone for you!" Mikey continued.

"That's okay, Mikey," April said, but she couldn't deal with the sad look on Mikey's face. "So…uhm…how about you tell me some more of your name-ideas?"

She heard Raph groan further in front of them, but she ignored it.

Mikey grinned from ear to ear. "You really wanna know?"

April nodded.

"Well, then we have this really cool name I made up for…"

April smiled at Mikey, but looked over to Raph from the corner of her eye.

_Okay, all I need to do now_, she thought, _is staying between Raph and Mikey, and everything is going to be okay._ She smirked as Raph tried for the first time to get closer to Mikey, but she blocked his way by making a step to the left.

_Yeah, I should be able to manage this._

And with a warm smile she focused on her task ahead.


	20. Texts from April

_This chapter deals with "New Girl in Town"._

* * *

**Chapter 20: Texts from April**

Donnie was sitting on the couch with an unconscious Mikey lying next to him and watched how Splinter and Raph talked about the burden of leadership.

That moment, his T-phone signaled an incoming text message with a beep and he got his T-phone it out to check who had sent him a message. It could be Leo. But he was surprised to see the message had been sent by April.

_Heard you guys are facing some family-troubles. Think you should talk. So if you're looking for Leo, he's going to the Byerly building._

"Then go get him," Splinter said at that moment.

"But sensei, I don't know where he is," Raph replied.

"He's going to the Byerly building," Donnie chimed in, suddenly finding himself the center of attention. He held up his phone. "April texted me," he explained, and then the full impact of these words hit him.

"April texted _me_!" He jumped to his feet and spread his arms with a big grin on his face. "Oh, this is the best day!" Then Mikey groaned, and Donnie remembered that his little brother was hurt.

His enthusiastic pose turned into a casual one immediately and the grin disappeared from his face.

"Well, I mean it's had its ups and downs," he added.

Splinter turned to Raph. "Go and look for Leonardo."

Raph nodded.

"What about me?" Donnie asked.

"You stay here and watch over Michelangelo."

"But what if Raph needs help?"

"Heh, don't you think I can talk to Leo without your help?" Raph asked angrily.

"I just think you might need a mediator," Donnie replied proudly.

"I'm giving you a mediator!" Raph called out and he was about to march over to Donnie, but Splinter blocked his way with his walking stick.

"Enough!" the mutant rat said sternly. "Raphael, you go to the Byerly building, Donatello, you stay here! Understood?"

"Hai sensei!" they replied with one voice, and Raph turned to leave, but not without giving Donnie an angry glare, which Donnie happened to ignore.

When Raph had pushed past the turnstiles, Donnie turned to Splinter.

"Sensei, are you sure Raph should do this alone? What if Leo and he get into another argument?" he asked cautiously.

"I am positive that your brother is going to manage this alone," Splinter said. "He may have anger issues, but his heart is in the right place. And I think when it comes down to it, Raphael knows pretty well when he needs to stand down."

_May__ have anger issues?_, Donnie thought, but he decided that right now, it was him who needed to stand down.

"Hai sensei," he said instead and sat down on the couch again.

Splinter just nodded and left for the dojo.

Donnie waited a little, then turned back to his T-phone to send a reply to April's text.

_Thanks, April. Raph's on his way._

His T-phone beeped again almost immediately.

_Okay. He better be careful._

Donnie smiled at this. It was good to know that April was afraid because of Raph's anger issues, too.

_No worries, I think he can handle it._

_Hope so. Tell me when they're back._

_I will._

_Thanks, Donnie._

_You're welcome, April._

* * *

For the rest of the night Donnie was up on cloud number nine because April had texted him. Him! Out of all the brothers, she had chosen _him_ to tell about Leo. This was so awesome! Okay, he was thinking a bit about why April had known what had happened. They hadn't talked to her about this yet. But hey, he could ask her next time she was at the lair. For now, he decided to be over the moon because _April had texted him!_ She could have sent a mass text to all of them, but no, only he, he alone had gotten this message. This was so awesome!

When Leo and Raph had returned and they had woken Mikey up with a slice of pizza, Raph and Leo were talking to each other at the other side of the living room. Mikey was munching on his pizza, so Donnie decided to tell April about it.

He took out his T-phone and sent her a text message.

_Leo and Raph are back. Everything's fine._

He received her reply almost immediately, and he somehow came to think that April had been staring at her T-phone all night to wait for a text. No, even more important, to wait for _his_ text! So awesome!

_I'm glad to hear that. Good night, Donnie!_

_Me too. Good night, April!_

And with a smile he tucked his T-phone away again.

* * *

The next day, April came over for a training session. Donnie was in his lab and realized that there still was some time left till training when he heard her enter, so he ran over to the door, greeted her and beckoned her over.

April walked over to him with a questioning look on her eyes.

"Everything okay, Donnie?"

"Yes, yes, absolutely," Donnie replied, and he had nearly added, _because you texted me!_ But luckily, he could stop himself before the words left his mouth.

But he must have been grinning like an idiot because April asked, "You sure?"

Donnie cleared his throat. "Yeah, yeah, of course I'm sure," he said. "I just wanted to thank you for yesterday. Without you, we would never have been able to find Leo."

"You're welcome. I'm glad I could help.

Donnie looked her over, weighing if he should ask her, but then decided that his curiosity had to have its way.

"How did you know?" asked.

April's eyes widened a bit and she shifted a bit uneasily. "Well, uhm, you see, Leo was at my place because he needed someone to talk to, and he told me about this g…quarrel you had."

"Yeah, he and Raph had quite an argument over Leo's qualities as a leader, and then Leo took off and left Raph as the new leader."

"He did?" April asked, and Donnie frowned at her, and she quickly cleared her throat.

"I mean, he left just like that?" April corrected herself.

"Yes, and then Raph had to find out the hard way that being leader is no cakewalk, but quite a burden, although I bet he enjoyed bossing us around." He smirked.

"I can imagine!" April giggled, but then she turned serious again. "So, you're all good now? Nothing happened?"

"Everything's fine. Well, okay, Snakeweed attacked Leo and Raph, but they defeated him, so yes, everything's back to normal." He looked April over. "Although it's a bit suspicious you always want to know if something happened. What else do you know?"

"Nothing!" April replied quickly. "It's just that I never saw you guys have a real dispute."

"Oh, we have those, believe me!" Donnie said. "But don't worry. We're a family. We always make up again."

"Okay." April smiled. "And you should definitely give Leo a break every now and then. He mentioned that he's tired of always being the responsible one and that he's waiting for his time to have fun."

Donnie raised a brow. "Really?" He had never seen Leo that way. He had always thought his brother enjoyed being the responsible one.

"Really," April assured him.

"Well, okay, I'll keep that in mind. And now I think it's time for training, right?"

"Guess so," April said.

And then they walked over to the dojo together.

But Donnie couldn't help, but think about what April had said. Leo was tired of being the responsible one? Were they talking about the same Leo?

On the other hand, it made sense. Ever since Leo had taken over the leadership, he had had to carry this heavy burden all by himself. And Donnie wondered what he could do to help him.

_Well, there's only one thing I can do_, he thought. _Make this burden a bit easier for him to carry whenever I get the chance._

And with this thought he entered the dojo.


End file.
